FH Mini 34 - Missed That Movie: Invitation to Hell

[0:00] Hey! Welcome to a Flophouse Mini.

Stuart Wellington

[0:08] The beauty of that was you told us right before we started learning that it was going to be perfect.

[0:13] One take Wellington, that's what they call me.

[0:15] Hey, I'm Stuart Wellington, one of the hosts of the hit podcast, The Flophouse Podcast.

[0:20] You're listening to one of our mini episodes.

[0:22] Now, normally when we record, we've just recently watched a bad movie,

[0:25] and the show is us reviewing it, plus other stuff.

[0:28] Tonight, we're not doing that at all.

[0:30] It's just the other stuff.

[0:31] It's a mini, it's other stuff.

[0:33] If this is your first episode, probably slam on the brakes, hit reverse, pick a different episode.

[0:40] Then you can come back to this one when you have a little bit of affection for us,

[0:44] and you like our brand of shenanigans.

[0:45] And then you're like, oh yeah, I'm willing to just sort of sit here while they dick around for a while.

[0:51] I'll put up with these guys.

[0:52] Now, the thing is, you're not just putting up with these guys.

[0:55] These guys being me, Stuart Wellington, and my two co-hosts, Dan, that's right, Dirty Dan McCoy.

[1:01] That's me.

[1:01] And Elliot over there, the main man, Elliot Kalen.

[1:05] Wubba Wubba?

[1:06] Is that my catchphrase?

[1:07] Yeah, Wubba Wubba.

[1:10] We're joined by a special guest this time.

[1:12] Not only is this gentleman the editor of our show and producer, I guess, editor, producer.

[1:19] He has been a longtime figure on the show.

[1:22] He helped write the song of the summer.

[1:24] He's the house cat.

[1:26] He edits and adds sound effects and does all kinds of great stuff to our Flop Tales bonus content,

[1:32] which you can access by becoming a MaxFun supporter.

[1:36] That's right, we are joined by musician, comedian, best man at my wedding, Alex Smith.

[1:43] How are you doing, Alex?

Alex Smith

[1:44] What's up, guys?

[1:46] It's nice to see Dirty Dan and Elliot over there Kalen.

[1:50] I believe he was also called the main man.

Elliott Kalan

[1:54] Elliot over there Kalen's main bit is that he's never quite where he's supposed to be.

[1:59] He's always slightly further away than you think he's going to be.

Stuart Wellington

[2:02] Yeah, yeah.

[2:03] I love it.

Elliott Kalan

[2:04] I mean, Alan Moore would write the shit out of that character.

[2:07] Oh, but he'd be doing all sorts of disgusting things.

[2:11] And then it would turn into a lot of...

[2:13] It's consensual.

[2:14] And then it would turn into...

[2:15] Sometimes.

[2:16] And then it would turn into a lot of in-jokes about British cartoon characters from the 1940s and 50s

[2:22] where I'd be like, I guess I understand this now.

[2:25] Wasn't this supposed to be about the great characters of literature fighting crime or something?

Dan McCoy

[2:29] Stop getting me excited, Elliot.

Alex Smith

[2:31] I guess you're a snake goddess now, too.

[2:33] Okay, whatever.

[2:34] Sounds right.

[2:35] I haven't read any Alan Moore, but I did see a...

[2:38] Get the fuck out of here.

[2:39] I saw...

[2:40] I saw a panel just this last week or something of a woman jacking off a big frog.

[2:48] Yeah.

[2:49] That was all I've seen.

Dan McCoy

[2:50] It was very reminiscent of Alan Moore's beard.

[2:54] There's a...

[2:55] Oh, boy.

[2:55] That's a point of connection.

Stuart Wellington

[2:57] When you went to the barber to get your beard trimmed up, did you select the wizard picture on the wall?

Alex Smith

[3:05] Yeah.

[3:05] I sat down in the chair.

[3:06] I scrolled through different mirrors like I was in Red Dead.

[3:10] And I picked the Alan Moore.

Elliott Kalan

[3:12] You said, give me the Dumbledore.

[3:15] The Jared Harris, not the Michael Gambon.

[3:18] Oh, sorry.

[3:19] I meant...

[3:19] Richard Harris.

[3:21] I'm sorry.

[3:21] Not his son, Jared Harris.

[3:22] It's Richard Harris.

Stuart Wellington

[3:23] That's the thing.

[3:24] That's a point of contention because he...

[3:26] Jared Harris lobbied pretty hard to get the role of young Dumbledore in Fantastic Beasts.

[3:30] Yumbledore.

[3:31] Young Dumbledore.

[3:32] Yumbledore.

[3:33] He was so called...

[3:34] It's a Dumbledore that fucks.

[3:35] I think we clearly established that.

[3:37] Yeah.

[3:37] Young, dumb, and full of Cumbledore.

[3:40] Is that Jared Harris...

[3:42] He wears that shirt to fucking spring break all the time.

Elliott Kalan

[3:45] And then he bumps into his students' families who are also on vacation.

[3:49] It's very awkward.

[3:51] But the real awkward thing was that Jared Harris actually lobbied hard to get old Dumbledore the role.

[3:54] So it was him against his father for the role of old Dumbledore or Obledore, as he's also called.

Alex Smith

[4:02] Obledoral stain.

[4:05] Obledore.

[4:06] Old, cold, and full of Moldoldore.

Stuart Wellington

[4:10] Not as popular of a T-shirt.

[4:13] He still wore it.

Elliott Kalan

[4:14] Still sells.

[4:16] Just not in the...

[4:16] It does sell.

[4:16] I mean, the other T-shirt is such a hot seller.

[4:18] And this one is still...

[4:19] It's a solid mid-list seller.

[4:21] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[4:21] I mean, that's more of a joke gift that people wear initially ironically.

[4:25] And then you're like, no, it's comfortable.

[4:27] It wears it like my body feels good in it.

Elliott Kalan

[4:29] You see a lot of pictures of elderly people wearing it over the shirt they were already wearing

[4:33] while blowing out candles on a cake.

Alex Smith

[4:35] Yeah.

[4:36] Yeah.

[4:37] Yeah.

[4:37] I was going to say, it's a really popular one to bring home to an uncle is what it sounds like.

[4:43] Yeah.

[4:44] You'll like this.

Elliott Kalan

[4:45] Yeah.

[4:45] That's what it says in the catalog.

[4:46] There's just a starburst.

[4:47] And inside it says, bring it home to your uncle.

[4:51] Why does your uncle live in your home?

[4:52] You don't know what he likes.

[4:53] You don't know what he likes.

[4:54] He's your uncle.

[4:55] How often do you see him?

[4:57] Maybe he wants a shirt that says old, cold, and full of mold.

Dan McCoy

[5:00] Great.

[5:00] He's your dad's brother.

[5:02] What are you supposed to do with that?

[5:03] You don't know.

[5:03] Yeah.

[5:04] You don't know him.

Alex Smith

[5:05] You don't know him at all.

[5:05] He's got a fake smile on every time you've seen him in your life.

[5:08] Tell me about it.

Stuart Wellington

[5:10] Well, the thing is that he's smiling, but his eyes, those eyes aren't smiling.

[5:14] There's sadness in there.

Elliott Kalan

[5:15] Well, those eyes have seen a lot of love, but they'll never see another like yours.

[5:18] So that's really why he's not smiling.

[5:19] Yeah.

[5:22] Alex, thanks so much for joining us.

[5:24] We really appreciate it.

[5:25] Of course.

[5:26] What a pleasure.

[5:27] So, Stu, is there any other, is there any thread running through this episode other than Alex

[5:32] being with us?

[5:33] Which is enough.

[5:33] A phantom thread.

[5:34] So that's the thing.

[5:36] Or a phantom menace.

[5:37] What if the phantom thread was a sequel to the phantom menace?

Stuart Wellington

[5:40] I think it would go a little something like this.

[5:43] Yeah.

[5:44] You explain a lot.

[5:45] Jar Jar keeps feeding Anakin mushrooms.

Elliott Kalan

[5:49] Mesa want to control you.

[5:51] How does a relationship work on that level?

[5:56] Yeah.

[5:57] Wow.

[5:58] Right.

[5:59] Low key.

[5:59] Right's itself there.

[6:00] Yeah.

[6:01] Guys, am I the only one whose favorite scene in phantom thread was when he was ordering breakfast?

[6:06] Oh, yeah.

[6:08] And she's like, you're a hungry boy.

[6:10] And I guess I was in such suspense because I was like, how is he going to eat all that?

[6:15] But you never actually see him eating it.

[6:17] Yeah.

[6:17] It was like a Groundhog Day breakfast that he was ordering.

Stuart Wellington

[6:20] Yeah.

[6:20] It's the kind of breakfast that a character in a movie sits down to and then is like, oh, I got to run.

[6:26] And you're like, what?

[6:27] There's like a full breakfast here.

[6:29] Yeah.

Alex Smith

[6:30] Pulls me out of every movie I've ever seen when somebody steps up from a full plate of food.

Stuart Wellington

[6:36] Yeah.

[6:36] He might as well.

[6:36] Like the Irishman?

[6:37] Why aren't you sitting down to eat all that food, Irishman?

Elliott Kalan

[6:40] Daniel J. Lewis might as well have said, give me the Pee-wee's Big Adventure.

[6:43] And they just put down a whole table of breakfast that he would take one bite of and walk away.

Dan McCoy

[6:47] Yes.

[6:48] He's ordering from, he's like, please, Vicky Creeps, bring me the Mr. T cereal.

[6:55] So I can pour it all over my scones.

Stuart Wellington

[6:58] So today we're doing something that we've done in the past.

[7:05] One of the first minis that we recorded was a thing called Miss That Movie.

[7:10] It's become a classic Flophouse mini.

[7:14] People love it.

[7:14] I still get emails every day about Rusty the Dog.

[7:18] Rusty a Dog's Tale.

[7:19] I don't even remember the name of the movie.

[7:21] That's how excited I am every time I get one of those emails.

[7:23] I don't even read it.

[7:25] So what happens, I actually originally watched that movie with my buddy Alex.

[7:30] Yeah, we watched it together.

[7:31] So Alex, you're the inspiration for Miss That Movie.

[7:35] And we were talking, I'm like, I got to get Alex on.

[7:38] He always watches movies that we missed.

[7:40] And so today we finally realized that fantasy.

Alex Smith

[7:44] Yeah, I'm very excited to be on here.

[7:47] And I sent a text to Stuart about this movie.

[7:50] I'm hoping that got relayed to you guys and that you haven't seen this movie.

[7:53] Well, I don't know.

[7:55] Also, warning, guys.

Stuart Wellington

[7:57] The text was not relayed to us.

[7:58] I've been microdosing THC gummies today.

[8:03] Let's just say I'm in a weird place.

Elliott Kalan

[8:08] Wow.

[8:08] All right.

[8:09] What counts as micro?

[8:10] How many of those THC gummies could dance on the head of a pin?

Stuart Wellington

[8:13] I don't know.

[8:14] I mean, that's the thing.

[8:15] They're microdosing.

[8:16] So if I take a handful, it's fine, right?

Elliott Kalan

[8:18] Remember when we were kids, everything was so much looser and they had those ads for microdose machines with the guy talking real fast?

[8:25] Telling you about how great it would be to just take tiny doses of drugs?

Stuart Wellington

[8:28] Yeah.

[8:29] Uh-huh.

[8:29] And it feels like he's just talking forever.

[8:31] Well, yeah, because you're microdosing.

[8:33] Tiny doser.

Elliott Kalan

[8:34] Your experience of time is totally out of whack.

[8:37] So you think he's talking really fast, but it's somehow taking him a long time?

[8:40] Very strange.

Stuart Wellington

[8:40] Every time I'm like, is the food he's eating extra clean because his mustache brushes off all the dust?

[8:46] Wait, that...

Dan McCoy

[8:47] I literally have never thought of that, but I love it.

[8:53] Is that...

[8:54] Yeah.

[8:54] Is that a secret power of mustaches?

[8:57] That's a thing.

[8:58] That I haven't been thinking about this whole time.

Elliott Kalan

[8:59] If you ever look really close at someone who's eating, you can notice their mustache is swishing back and forth like in a car wash, just knocking all the dust off their food.

Dan McCoy

[9:07] Yeah.

[9:08] Yeah.

[9:08] I should...

[9:09] I gotta stop trimming my mustache.

[9:11] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[9:11] The whole time I'm like, I wish I...

[9:12] I'm losing half of the efficacy.

[9:14] The whole time I'm like, I wish I was inside that food right now.

Dan McCoy

[9:19] Watching the thing brush me clean.

[9:22] Yeah.

[9:24] Your advice earlier that you should build up some affection for us before listening to this episode has never been truer.

Elliott Kalan

[9:31] So, Alex, what's this movie that you texted Stuart about and he didn't tell us?

Alex Smith

[9:36] It's called Invitation to Hell.

Elliott Kalan

[9:38] Oh, I've never seen it.

[9:40] I have not, but I guess...

[9:42] Oh, right.

[9:42] I guess it got lost in the mail.

Stuart Wellington

[9:44] Is it in the Criterion Collection or...

Elliott Kalan

[9:47] Yeah, what Czech New Wave director made this one?

[9:51] Because I may not have been exposed to it otherwise.

[9:54] Was it Jan Nemec?

Alex Smith

[9:56] Well, it's...

[9:57] You know what?

[9:58] It's funny you should ask who it's directed by because it's a made-for-TV movie, which you might think is directed by somebody you've never heard of.

[10:05] Yeah.

[10:06] But this one was directed by Wes Craven.

[10:09] This is a...

[10:09] What?

[10:10] Wes Craven directed...

[10:12] Let's see.

[10:14] I gotta pull the opposite...

Stuart Wellington

[10:14] Was it like early in his career?

[10:16] Late in his career?

[10:17] It's from 1984.

[10:19] So...

[10:19] Oh, so right in the middle of his career.

[10:20] So right...

[10:21] So, yeah.

[10:22] That was his...

[10:23] Yeah, that was his, like, off year.

[10:25] That was where he...

[10:25] But he directed under his...

[10:26] Took his sabbatical.

[10:27] Under his pseudonym, East Craven.

Dan McCoy

[10:30] Did Elm Street come out in 84?

[10:33] Like, that's...

Alex Smith

[10:34] Am I wrong?

[10:35] It sounds like that's around the time, right?

[10:37] But...

[10:37] Wait, no.

[10:38] It's...

[10:38] Is Elm Street, like, 80?

[10:41] I'm spacing on whether it was earlier than 84.

[10:44] Well, only one way to find out.

[10:45] Elm Street came out in 84.

[10:47] Oh, 84.

Elliott Kalan

[10:48] Yeah, okay.

[10:48] But he had already made, like, the house at the end of the street or whatever it's called.

[10:52] Last house on the left.

[10:53] The last house on the left.

[10:53] House on the end of the street.

[10:54] Last house on the left.

[10:56] Yeah.

[10:56] We all agree it's a house somewhere.

[11:00] And it's the last house.

[11:01] There's no other houses past that one.

Alex Smith

[11:02] Report fairy about where the house was, but...

[11:05] Oh, yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[11:05] And he made the hills have eyes.

Alex Smith

[11:07] Well, this isn't...

[11:08] Slump thing.

[11:09] I'm gonna say, he's not slumming it in this.

[11:12] Like, this is not...

[11:13] Like, he won...

[11:14] This won a primetime Emmy for Art Direction.

[11:16] Whoa.

[11:17] It's written by, what, the guy who wrote, like, Universal Soldier.

[11:22] So maybe that's not a great example, but...

Stuart Wellington

[11:24] Somebody who has some big ideas.

[11:26] Yeah, John Updike.

[11:26] Big ideas.

Dan McCoy

[11:27] Oh, look at this.

[11:28] Robert Urich, Susan Lucci, Kevin McCarthy.

Alex Smith

[11:32] Yeah.

[11:32] It's got...

[11:33] And it's got the guy from Murphy Brown, who plays, what, Frank?

[11:37] It's a...

[11:37] Soleil Moon Fries in it?

[11:39] What's his name?

[11:40] Oh, no.

[11:40] Regal Butoh?

[11:41] Regal Butoh?

Stuart Wellington

[11:41] It's a whole gun and Betty Lou's handbag situation over here.

[11:44] I love me some IMDb.

Alex Smith

[11:46] Yeah.

[11:47] Oh, it's a...

[11:48] I mean, you'll find a ton of great stuff in the IMDb.

[11:50] This was...

[11:51] So...

[11:51] Yeah, we learned a lot recently about the gun and Betty Lou's handbag.

Elliott Kalan

[11:54] That was...

[11:54] Yeah.

Alex Smith

[11:57] Yeah.

[11:57] If at any point my description of this movie gets super boring,

[12:01] feel free to jump back into the universe of Betty Lou's handbag.

[12:04] I just want...

Elliott Kalan

[12:04] I just...

[12:05] I may have to correct you on something, Alex.

[12:06] Did you say it won Art Direction in the Emmys?

Alex Smith

[12:09] According to IMDb, it was going to be nominated.

[12:11] Oh, nominated.

[12:12] Sorry.

[12:13] Oh.

Alex Smith

[12:13] Listen.

[12:14] I'm going to have to look up who it lost to.

[12:16] Okay.

[12:18] Now, see, I think it's a prize just to be nominated personally.

Elliott Kalan

[12:22] It lost to a production of A Streetcar Named Desire.

[12:25] Ooh, sorry.

Dan McCoy

[12:27] I mean, that seems like a lazy choice on the television.

[12:31] It does seem like a very lazy choice.

[12:34] Yeah.

[12:34] But this was...

Elliott Kalan

[12:35] But Anne-Margaret as Blanche Dubois.

[12:37] Treat Williams as Stanley Kowalski.

[12:38] Beverly D'Angelo as Stella.

[12:39] Treat Williams?

[12:40] Randy Quaid as Mitch.

[12:41] You know what, guys?

[12:43] We should be talking about this one.

[12:44] Okay.

[12:45] Oh, Bill Irwin is in it, but not that.

[12:47] Bill Irwin.

Dan McCoy

[12:49] Oh, a different Bill Irwin was in it?

[12:50] Different Bill Irwin.

[12:51] Not with an I, but with an E.

[12:53] The guy who's in Planes, Trains, and Automobiles and Home Alone.

[12:56] He's also a contortionist, right?

[12:58] He's the old guy in the airport in every John Hughes movie, apparently.

Elliott Kalan

[13:02] Now, in case you were wondering, this is Outstanding Art Direction for a limited series or a special.

[13:06] Outstanding Art Direction for a series went to the Duck Factory, the early Jim Carrey vehicle.

[13:10] Oh, I don't know anything about that.

[13:13] We're struck down.

[13:14] All right.

[13:14] Well, never mind.

[13:15] Forget it.

[13:16] Continue.

[13:16] So, Invitation to Hell.

Alex Smith

[13:18] Yeah.

[13:18] Invitation to Hell is – here's the thing.

[13:21] So, here's how I found this movie is through the pandemic, one of the things that I did to keep myself entertained and try to do entertaining stuff,

[13:31] not being able to do shows and regular – just my regular stuff that I do both on stage and online.

[13:43] We started watching movies on Twitch on my stream, the Big Howl and Possum stream, in my other moniker that is Big Howl.

Stuart Wellington

[13:52] Okay.

[13:53] Nice plug.

[13:54] I like it.

Alex Smith

[13:55] There we go.

[13:56] Big Howl and Possum stream.

[13:58] So, we started watching movies on that.

[14:01] That's when Stuart came on and watched Rusty with us.

Stuart Wellington

[14:04] Didn't we also watch that Dolly Parton, Kenny Rogers holiday special?

Alex Smith

[14:09] Yeah, we watched a Christmas special with Kenny and Dolly.

Stuart Wellington

[14:14] It was taped off of, like, New Zealand TV, so it was all, like, all the ads were for, like, summertime shit.

Alex Smith

[14:20] Yeah, the movie was pretty weak, but the ads were all for, like, sunscreen on Australian beaches.

[14:26] So, there was, like, a nice little treat every, you know, 10 minutes or whatever.

[14:30] But, so, one of the things that we started doing on Twitch was just watching a movie.

[14:35] A lot of times, just something on YouTube.

[14:37] And a lot of times, we would pick made-for-TV stuff because we wouldn't have to freak out and worry about the terms of service if something naked happened on it.

[14:45] If we picked a made-for-TV movie.

[14:49] And this, which we watched with my friend Mandy, who's a great comedian here in Louisville, Kentucky, where I live.

[14:56] This one turned out to be, like, a real treat from the pandemic for me, where it was very memorable.

[15:02] And I was like, I definitely want to go back and watch that again.

[15:05] And I definitely want to tell other people that they should go check it out.

[15:08] Because it is great.

[15:09] It's very of its time, but it's got a lot of great art direction, like, as the Emmy Awards.

[15:15] Emmy-nominated.

[15:16] Not quite as good as Streetcar Named Desire, but up there.

Stuart Wellington

[15:19] Which feature, there was a different treat.

[15:21] Treat Williams.

Alex Smith

[15:23] It's got, I would argue, it's got great pacing.

[15:27] It's got great performances.

[15:29] And the value, like, the value of it, maybe not the, it's not like, it's clearly not a big Hollywood movie.

[15:34] But the overall value of it is better than what you expect from a made-for-TV film, in my opinion.

[15:41] It's really good.

Stuart Wellington

[15:42] Now, just to remind listeners at home, miss that movie, what happens is, Alex is going to walk us through the movie a little bit.

[15:49] Yeah.

[15:49] And then we have to determine if we are sad we missed it, glad we missed it, or had to not miss it, and we go and watch it.

Dan McCoy

[16:02] I'm not sure about the tense of that last one.

[16:06] I'm pretty sure it's correct.

Elliott Kalan

[16:08] Let me check my rhyming dictionary.

[16:10] It checks out.

Alex Smith

[16:12] Okay, well.

[16:14] Asked and answered, I guess.

[16:15] I think you guys are going to rate this as sad you missed it.

[16:18] Once you hear the first 20 seconds of this movie, what happens in the first 20 seconds.

[16:23] So what happens is we are in, somewhere in California, we find out it's basically Silicon Valley.

[16:28] And there is a limo driver driving a limo into a...

[16:34] Makes sense.

[16:34] So far, it checks out.

[16:35] Okay.

[16:36] Yeah.

[16:38] You haven't stolen someone else's car.

Elliott Kalan

[16:40] Just riding an alligator would be ridiculous.

[16:42] So driving a limo makes more sense.

Alex Smith

[16:44] Driving a limo onto the parking lot of a country club that is called the Steaming Springs Country Club.

[16:54] Outsteps...

[16:54] Mm-hmm.

[16:56] Outsteps Susan Lucci in an outfit that looks like she's about to board the Moonraker.

[17:01] She's wearing like a red jumpsuit or, you know, like onesie type long suit.

[17:08] And metal teeth.

Stuart Wellington

[17:08] Real quick, real quick, Dan, you probably already picked out an outfit that you would

[17:12] wear if you were going to board the Moonraker.

[17:15] What is it?

[17:15] Well, Dan was sitting...

[17:16] Specifically the Moonraker?

[17:17] Is it your housing t-shirt?

Elliott Kalan

[17:19] I know for days, Dan was sitting at home expecting Jeff Bezos' car to come get him to go on the

[17:23] spaceship.

[17:24] And I know it was a big disappointment for you, Dan, when you found out the launch had happened

[17:27] and they had not sent a car to pick you up.

[17:28] So what outfit did you pick for space?

Dan McCoy

[17:31] It's kind of...

[17:32] I mean, it's like...

[17:33] I basically stapled two really big potato chip bags together over myself.

[17:41] Like one on top of me, one below me.

[17:43] Oh, so not like a sandwich board.

[17:45] Like a diaper...

Stuart Wellington

[17:46] Like a onesie.

[17:47] In...

[17:48] Where I come from, we call that an Ut-seedo.

[17:51] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[17:53] I'm just, you know, I'm afraid of the, like, you know, like space rays, different kinds of...

Elliott Kalan

[17:58] And you figure, what's more protected than potato chips?

[18:00] I better use the space-age technology that keeps them pure.

Dan McCoy

[18:04] Keeps them crunchy will keep me safe.

Elliott Kalan

[18:06] Now, what about your...

[18:07] Now, this covered your arms and legs, too?

[18:09] Or I'm imagining like a onesie with your arms and legs sticking out of it.

Dan McCoy

[18:11] I'm in sort of a pod at that point.

[18:14] So these are very big potato chip bags.

[18:16] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[18:17] Like human-sized potato chip bags.

Dan McCoy

[18:19] Yeah, Sam's Club.

[18:20] Yeah, no, I went to Costco for these.

[18:22] Okay.

Alex Smith

[18:25] Human-sized potato chip bags.

[18:27] Like bags that hold human-sized potato chips.

Elliott Kalan

[18:29] Yeah, it holds seven human-sized potato chips.

[18:32] Because when they're that big, you don't need that many of them.

[18:33] Just crack off a piece and have it.

Dan McCoy

[18:35] That's true.

[18:36] The USDA recommends one-fourth of a potato chip.

Elliott Kalan

[18:40] I don't know if the USDA recommends any potato chips, really, as part of your daily diet.

Dan McCoy

[18:45] They'll allow it, but I don't think...

[18:46] What have I been listening to?

Elliott Kalan

[18:49] Like, Dan, there are four food groups.

[18:51] Potato chips, ice cream, Cheetos, and spicy Cheetos.

Stuart Wellington

[18:55] Yeah, I'm sorry to report that it stands for U.S. Dumbass.

[19:00] Oh, shit.

[19:02] Oh!

[19:03] Oh, shit.

Alex Smith

[19:06] So Susan Lucci was in a limousine going to space.

[19:09] Okay, so two women in bikinis step out into the parking lot, and they distract the limo driver.

[19:16] He's, like, he's sort of gawking at them.

[19:18] And he almost runs over Susan Lucci.

[19:22] But she drops to the ground very quickly, like, just sort of as if she's, like, spring-loaded, right?

[19:29] She just sort of drops back to the ground.

[19:31] The limo drives over her, and then he freaks out because he knows that she's the director of the country club,

[19:39] and he must have killed her.

[19:41] And he slams on the brakes, turns around.

[19:45] She pops up behind the car, does a finger gun at him with two fingers, I believe,

[19:52] and the rear windshield of the limo shatters, and he belts in his seat.

[20:00] And then she comes around and laughs at his, like, charred, burned-up corpse in the front seat of the car.

[20:08] I already lost the forever.

Stuart Wellington

[20:09] You did not undersell this, Alex.

[20:11] Yeah.

[20:12] How?

Elliott Kalan

[20:13] I think you're going to find that out, Dan.

[20:15] I think I'm going to tell you what I tell my son Sammy all the time,

[20:18] which is if the movie doesn't want you to know something yet, they won't tell you,

[20:22] and they'll tell you when they want you to know it.

[20:24] He's big on the, like, who's that?

[20:25] What's that?

[20:26] What's that going on?

[20:27] Where's that?

[20:28] We were slowly in pieces watching Episode II, Attack of the Clones,

[20:31] which is the worst Star Wars movie probably to watch slowly in pieces

[20:34] because it feels like it'll never end.

[20:36] And he's kind of like, what's that character?

[20:38] What's that?

[20:38] You'll find out.

[20:39] It's supposed to be a mystery.

Stuart Wellington

[20:40] It's a mystery.

[20:41] Yeah, that's what I was saying.

[20:42] Who's Sifo-D-Eyes?

[20:44] Like, don't worry.

[20:44] It'll all be explained.

Elliott Kalan

[20:45] Well, it's hard to actually tell in the Star Wars movie

[20:47] because it's either you'll find out, just hold on,

[20:50] or you'll never see that character again.

[20:51] It doesn't matter.

[20:52] Just buy the toy.

[20:53] Like, they'll get no more screen time.

Alex Smith

[20:56] Now, Stuart, you said I didn't undersell the movie.

[20:59] So let me ask.

[21:01] Should I have said, no, the first 20 seconds or whatever is boring?

[21:05] Or what should I have said instead to prepare you all for Susan Lucci finger gunning a guy to death?

Stuart Wellington

[21:12] No, what I was saying is that you didn't undersell.

[21:15] That means you sold it, right?

[21:17] Yeah, you sold it accurately.

[21:17] Is that what it means?

[21:18] Right.

[21:18] Yeah, that's what I meant.

Alex Smith

[21:20] Okay, wait.

[21:20] I think I heard that wrong.

[21:22] So, yeah.

[21:23] Okay.

[21:23] I didn't undersell it.

Stuart Wellington

[21:25] I did a double negative.

Elliott Kalan

[21:27] Now, Alex, what is it in your makeup that makes you see compliments as a tax?

[21:32] This is something I think we need to get into.

Alex Smith

[21:35] Well, I just always feel like I could strive to do better, Elliot, honestly.

[21:38] I just really always feel like I could be working harder.

Stuart Wellington

[21:41] That actually sounds pretty good in a producer, guys.

[21:44] Do you think you should keep going?

Alex Smith

[21:47] All right.

[21:48] So, and I don't know.

[21:50] I could literally describe every scene of this movie now.

[21:53] I've now watched it three times, and I could tell you just.

Elliott Kalan

[21:56] Well, this is a Flophouse Mini, which means we only have an hour and a half to tell people things.

Alex Smith

[21:59] We only have the rest of time.

Elliott Kalan

[22:01] We only have three to four times as much as an average episode of 99% Invisible with one one-hundredth the information.

Alex Smith

[22:08] So, after that happens, the limo driver melts, and Susan Lucci comes over and laughs at him.

[22:14] And then, so then we cut to a family driving across the country.

[22:19] And this is Robert Urich.

[22:21] What's her name?

[22:22] Joanna Cassidy.

[22:23] TV Spencer.

Dan McCoy

[22:25] You could hire him if you like.

[22:27] Robert Urich.

[22:28] And also TV's Lazarus man, right?

[22:29] Yeah.

[22:31] I think so.

[22:32] I think so.

Stuart Wellington

[22:34] Was he in Ice Pirates?

Elliott Kalan

[22:37] Only one way to find out.

[22:39] Siri.

[22:40] Was Robert Urich in Ice Pirates?

[22:43] I'll look into that now.

Alex Smith

[22:44] Pull up Betty Lou's handbag and find out if he was in there.

[22:47] Let's find out.

[22:47] Let's open up Betty Lou's handbag.

Elliott Kalan

[22:48] Yes.

[22:49] He played the role of Jason.

[22:51] Thank you, Siri.

[22:52] Yep.

Alex Smith

[22:54] So, and then, so it's, it's Robert Urich plays Matt Winslow.

[22:59] Oh.

[23:00] His wife is Pat Winslow, played by Joanne Cassidy from, she's Dolores in Who Framed Roger Rabbit.

[23:07] And she's in, she's in Blade Runner.

[23:10] And their superhero son, Bat Winslow.

Dan McCoy

[23:13] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[23:17] Criminals are a superstitious cowardly lot.

[23:19] I shall become a Bat Winslow.

Elliott Kalan

[23:21] I'll address as a Winslow.

[23:23] The family from Family Matters?

[23:25] Well, a different family called Winslow.

Alex Smith

[23:27] There's a, there's a, uh, older boy, maybe eight or nine.

[23:31] And then there's a, uh, younger girl, maybe five or six.

[23:35] Something like that.

[23:35] You meet this family.

[23:37] You find out they're nice.

[23:38] You find out they're nice people.

[23:40] And you find out that he's some kind of genius who's being brought to work on a top secret,

[23:45] uh, tech operation for some company.

[23:49] Uh, you find out that, sorry, I just spilled tea on my keyboard.

[23:53] So it's distracting me right now.

[23:55] Oh no.

[23:55] Is it going to be okay?

[23:57] It's going to be fine.

[23:58] It's going to be fine.

[23:58] I, it's funny.

[23:59] I spilled it on a spot where I had already spilled tea before.

[24:02] And I haven't, I haven't had those keys for like a couple months.

[24:06] Oh boy.

[24:07] Uh, so the, so, you know, plus side of a producer is that they care about the work they do.

[24:13] A drawback is that he, he doesn't have keys that work on his keyboard.

[24:17] That's the trade-off.

Elliott Kalan

[24:19] That's the trade-off.

[24:20] When you look for a great producer, you say, do his keys work?

[24:22] They do.

[24:23] Then I'm not interested.

Dan McCoy

[24:24] Yeah.

[24:25] You're like, do you have, how,

[24:27] how's your tab?

[24:28] Do you have a good, do you have a good function?

Stuart Wellington

[24:31] That's what they say in producer schools.

[24:33] They say, uh, put on all your keys and then take one key off.

Alex Smith

[24:39] Well, the thing I've been telling my, uh, my Twitch chat is that I will replace the keyboard

[24:43] when I have a third key go out.

[24:45] And I think we might've done it here tonight.

[24:47] Okay.

[24:48] Wow.

[24:48] Yeah.

[24:49] It's a three strikes rule with the, with the keyboard for me.

[24:52] We get to their house in the neighborhood that they're going to be living in.

[24:57] Which is apparently a pretty tight knit, but wealthy affluent neighborhood in Silicon Valley,

[25:01] where everybody works on computers and stuff.

[25:05] And, um, and they are sitting down for their first night together.

[25:09] And, oh, we find out that the kid, the boy, we find out that he's very smart and into computers because while the movers are moving all their stuff into the house,

[25:18] he's sitting at a computer and one of the movers is like, what are you playing a game?

[25:23] And he goes, no, I'm checking the inventory.

[25:25] And the guy goes, what?

[25:27] Why are you checking?

[25:28] Cause apparently this kid has an inventory of everything that was in the house and the guy

[25:32] sort of makes fun of him.

[25:33] And then he says, well, I know, I know that a candy bar is already missing.

[25:37] And the mover goes, oh, and then he like sneaks a candy bar out of his pocket and puts it

[25:42] like up on the kid's bed.

[25:44] Like the kid caught him.

[25:45] Uh, and he says something about kids these days or something.

[25:48] But you learn that the kid is very good at computers and brilliant.

Elliott Kalan

[25:51] And extremely, extremely anal.

[25:53] If he is down to the candy bar.

Dan McCoy

[25:54] Yeah, microchipped this candy bar.

[25:56] I'm not really sure how this, this machine, this program works.

Elliott Kalan

[26:00] Uh, sir, sir, sir, this piggy bank had 97 pennies in it and now shakes it.

[26:06] It sounds like it only has 96.

[26:07] Here you go.

[26:09] Takes a penny out of his pocket.

Stuart Wellington

[26:10] This, this Ziploc bag had 14, uh, camel cash, camel bucks in it.

[26:16] Now there's only 13.

Alex Smith

[26:18] He's like, the kid is also a heavy smoker.

[26:20] He smokes camel wides.

[26:22] Uh, it was 1984.

[26:25] It was a different time.

[26:26] Saving up.

[26:27] Yeah.

[26:28] Uh, so, so then the family is, uh, sort of gathered around the fire and I think they're

[26:32] like singing a song or something.

[26:34] They're doing something very wholesome and very quaint.

[26:36] Uh, and, uh, and everyone's having a great time.

[26:38] And then you, we get the first jump scare of the movie and it's because there's some rustling

[26:42] outside.

[26:43] And then some people wearing masks, like suddenly pop up in like a sliding glass door and you

[26:48] go, ah, and you freak out.

[26:49] And it turns out it's, uh, one of Matt Winslow's old frat buddies and his family.

[26:55] Frat Winslow.

[26:56] Who are already higher ups at the, uh, at the company.

[27:00] This is the guy from Murphy Brown, the guy who plays Frank Fontaine on Murphy Brown.

[27:03] Joe Regalbato, I think is his name.

Elliott Kalan

[27:07] And, um, uh.

[27:09] Regalbuto, which is Latin for, for Royal Butane Lighter.

[27:13] Regalbuto.

[27:15] I thought it was beautiful ass.

Alex Smith

[27:17] Latin for beautiful ass.

[27:18] I mean, I don't speak Latin, so it's possible.

[27:19] Yeah.

[27:20] So the kids run off and play together.

[27:22] We find out that the other kids are a little creepy.

[27:24] They're a little weird.

[27:26] We don't know why.

[27:27] Uh, we find out that there's a country club in town that has a, uh, Halloween party coming

[27:32] up that everyone loves.

[27:33] That's everyone's favorite thing.

[27:34] It's a Halloween party.

[27:36] Um, which is weird for a country club, I think, but it makes sense for the scary movie for

[27:41] it to be a Halloween party.

[27:43] Um.

[27:44] I mean, country clubs could celebrate Halloween.

Stuart Wellington

[27:46] I guess so, yeah.

[27:46] Dan, you spend a lot of time at country clubs.

[27:48] Do they do Halloween parties?

Dan McCoy

[27:50] I have never, ever been to a country club in my life.

[27:52] I don't want this getting out there in the world.

[27:55] Well, Dan, what about you?

Elliott Kalan

[27:56] I remember you used to be like, oh, this Daily Show job is really getting me down.

[28:00] I got it.

[28:00] This week I'm heading to Mar-a-Lago and I'm not coming back till the day before we return.

Dan McCoy

[28:05] I don't, uh, yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[28:08] You'd come back and you'd be like, yeah, me and Don were talking.

[28:10] He's got some good ideas.

[28:11] And I'd be like, what Don do you mean?

[28:13] Donald Trump or Donald Trump Jr.?

[28:14] And you'd say both.

[28:15] I'd just call them both Don.

[28:16] They both got great ideas.

[28:18] I'd be like, I don't know, Dan.

[28:19] And he'd go, eh, you'll understand someday.

[28:20] Or maybe you won't.

[28:22] Peasant.

[28:22] And then he would laugh and laugh and get in his limo.

Dan McCoy

[28:24] I'd cackle and I'd drive off in my jet-powered Ferrari.

Alex Smith

[28:30] You'd say, oh, I just had a great mask-free week down at Mar-a-Lago.

Elliott Kalan

[28:35] Yeah.

[28:36] And at the time it meant nothing.

[28:37] You know, but now it's ominous, you know.

Stuart Wellington

[28:39] At that point it was because he had previously told us that everyone wore masks for the Halloween parties.

[28:44] Yeah, no, I would laugh hard and be like, you'll get it someday.

Dan McCoy

[28:48] And then I'd...

Elliott Kalan

[28:49] And then you'd say, Fidelio, and you'd walk away.

Alex Smith

[28:55] All right, so...

[28:57] So it's Halloween at the country club.

[28:59] Yeah, there's a Halloween party coming up at the Steaming Springs country club that everyone in the neighborhood belongs to.

[29:04] And that Tom, the friend...

[29:05] I'm having so much trouble.

Elliott Kalan

[29:06] So Steaming Springs is the name of the club or the town?

Alex Smith

[29:09] I forgot.

[29:10] Steaming Springs is the name of the country club.

Elliott Kalan

[29:12] Okay, because it sounds like a country club from a Cinemax softcore movie where everyone's like...

[29:16] They're like, ugh, it's time for our story night at Steaming Springs.

[29:21] Tell us a tale, you know.

Alex Smith

[29:22] Well, they were trying to come up with something hot sounding, I'll just say.

[29:27] A little clue there.

[29:29] It has to be hot sounding.

Dan McCoy

[29:30] I will say that Steaming Springs is the only way to straighten them.

[29:34] Springs are notoriously curled.

Elliott Kalan

[29:36] Dan, you don't want to straighten them.

[29:38] No, then you just get a rod.

[29:40] That's all that...

[29:41] A very thin rod.

[29:42] Pretty worthless.

[29:43] Pretty worthless, I gotta say.

[29:46] I'd say Dan getting a new mattress and opening it up and being like, these springs, they're so cool.

[29:53] Once again, I have to correct the factory's mistake.

[29:58] And you call Stanley Steamer and Stanley Steamer's like, eh, it's a living.

[30:01] I guess I'll do it.

Alex Smith

[30:03] Okay, so there's a moment at the end of the night that night.

[30:07] There's great...

[30:08] I will say the exposition in this movie has done really great.

[30:11] Everything's sort of doled out really quickly and really, really well.

[30:15] We find out...

[30:16] We get to know where everybody is in really efficient ways.

[30:19] And at the end of the night, there's a great love scene between...

[30:22] A great love scene.

[30:23] Now I sound like a pervert.

[30:24] But there's a...

Elliott Kalan

[30:26] You meant in terms of like Romeo and Juliet, like the great love stories of history.

[30:30] No, no, no.

Dan McCoy

[30:30] Well, on the skin-o-meter, Alex.

Elliott Kalan

[30:33] It's pronounced skin-o-meter.

Alex Smith

[30:35] Skin-o-meter.

[30:36] There's a five-star buck-naked fuck-fest.

Stuart Wellington

[30:40] Except to peaches, fuck the pain away.

Elliott Kalan

[30:46] Now, I believe there probably is a movie called Five Star Butt-Naked Pants.

[30:52] And those stars are Robert Urich, Susan Logey, the stars of Invitation to Hell.

[30:59] Directed by Chest Craven.

[31:02] And Craven is spelled C-R-A-V-I-N apostrophe.

[31:05] Exactly.

[31:06] Exactly.

[31:07] So, it's a...

[31:08] Okay, so here's what I'll say.

Stuart Wellington

[31:09] You don't see that as a last name that often, an apostrophe at the end.

Alex Smith

[31:12] But you know what?

[31:13] It works.

Elliott Kalan

[31:13] You don't.

[31:16] A bust mare on Sex Street by Sex Craven.

[31:21] They're really not thinking very...

[31:23] These parody porn titles are really unimaginative.

Dan McCoy

[31:26] Sex Craven is a great porno name.

[31:29] Cream 4?

[31:30] Okay.

[31:32] I guess so.

[31:34] So I just mean it's a...

Stuart Wellington

[31:35] They don't even have to change the name of Shocker.

[31:40] So I just...

Elliott Kalan

[31:41] I meant to get Wes Craven's...

Stuart Wellington

[31:43] The peephole under the hairs.

Elliott Kalan

[31:47] I meant to get Wes Craven's new nightmare and I accidentally got Sex Craven's nude nightmare.

[31:51] And you know, I watched it anyway.

[31:52] It's not as scary, but you know.

[31:58] Still scary.

[31:59] Still scary.

[32:00] Still a little scary.

[32:02] It's a good premise.

[32:03] It's hard to do that premise wrong.

Alex Smith

[32:05] I think it's actually called Nude Quite Bear.

Elliott Kalan

[32:08] Nude Quite...

[32:09] At that point, it's very hard to tell what it's a parody of anymore.

[32:12] It's very...

[32:12] Sex Craven is a nude quite bear.

[32:14] Very redundant.

[32:16] Quiet bear.

Alex Smith

[32:18] Wait, what did you say?

[32:19] It's not even a...

[32:19] It's not even a porno.

[32:20] It's just the same movie with everyone naked throughout the whole thing.

Elliott Kalan

[32:24] And it would probably just be The Hills Have Boobs, I'm guessing.

[32:27] Or The Hills Are Boobs would be like this.

Dan McCoy

[32:30] Thighs, I feel like, rhymes with the eyes.

[32:32] I think there's...

[32:32] Well, anyway.

[32:33] It does, but...

[32:34] Move on.

[32:34] Like, let's...

[32:35] We could do this for hours, right?

Elliott Kalan

[32:37] When we bring these presentation pitches to the estate of Wes Craven, I think we can...

[32:44] See, Wes Craven's ghost.

[32:45] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[32:46] We have some interest from the reality kings.

Dan McCoy

[32:54] Sir, we're interested in all of your work.

[32:56] We'll get to a Music of the Heart porn parody eventually.

Elliott Kalan

[32:59] We'll do a Vampire and Butlin.

[33:01] We'll get there.

[33:02] But it's not...

[33:02] It's not an A release.

Dan McCoy

[33:04] It's not what you're known for.

[33:06] Mr. Ghost of Wes Craven.

Elliott Kalan

[33:11] It's John Carpenter's Ghost of Wes Craven.

[33:13] That's the movie.

[33:17] Ghost of Breast Craven?

[33:19] It's John...

[33:20] Now there's a pun on the name of the director of the guy?

[33:24] It's Schlong Carpenter's Ghost of Sex Craven.

[33:28] Oh, God.

[33:30] Wow.

Dan McCoy

[33:31] It's really conceptual now, but sure, I guess.

Elliott Kalan

[33:34] Yeah.

[33:35] But John Carpenter's like, whatever, man.

[33:37] I'll allow it.

[33:37] Can I do the score?

[33:38] Sure.

[33:39] Yeah, we would love that.

Alex Smith

[33:41] That's my name now, probably.

[33:45] So, yeah.

[33:46] So, there's just a nice little candlelit lovemaking scene where afterwards she essentially says,

[33:52] I'm so excited I'm no longer going to be poor and struggling and my husband's going to be working hard

[33:59] and we're not going to be getting the thing.

[34:01] She says that she's excited to be part of a higher society or whatever.

[34:06] Or whatever that, you know.

[34:07] Sure.

[34:07] So, next day is his first day driving to work or riding to work.

[34:13] He rides with Tom, his friend that we met earlier.

[34:16] Okay.

[34:16] Check that.

[34:17] And Tom has a guy in the back seat who is shadowing him and bossing him around and being kind of shitty to him

[34:23] who is apparently the representative from the Steaming Springs Country Club that is deciding whether or not Tom gets to join.

[34:31] So, you know that this is like a tough thing to be able to join this country club, right?

[34:39] And then we get to the company that he's now working for, which is called Micro Digitech.

[34:48] And what he's developing...

Elliott Kalan

[34:50] That's right up there with the fake technology company from Shattered Glass, which I think is called Juked Micotronics or something like that.

[34:57] Where they're like, come on.

[34:59] How did you not know this guy was making stuff up?

Alex Smith

[35:01] So, Micro Digitech is making a suit because, as Tom says at some point, the government wants to put someone on Venus in like three years,

[35:13] which seems a little ambitious in 1984, I've got to say.

Elliott Kalan

[35:16] It was morning in America.

[35:17] We were ready to do big things then.

[35:19] Communism was on the decline.

[35:21] Venus was what everyone was talking about.

[35:22] Yep.

[35:23] So, we needed a suit that you would be...

Alex Smith

[35:25] Not only...

[35:26] So, here's the goals of this suit that are laid out as we sort of find out, as we see the scenes of them developing this suit.

[35:34] Already, it is highly heat resistant because it's hot on Venus, apparently.

[35:39] Very much so.

[35:39] You want to have a suit that can withstand hundreds and thousands of degrees, right?

[35:46] It also has a laser beam that pops out of the wrist like, what's it?

[35:53] Like a taxi driver?

[35:55] He's got a little spring-loaded gun.

[35:58] Spring-loaded laser that comes out of the wrist.

Stuart Wellington

[36:01] Man, imagine if he had access to a little laser gun, though.

[36:04] He would have destroyed that guy's whole hand, not just shot off the fingers.

Elliott Kalan

[36:08] That guy, it's Harvey Gytel.

[36:11] Well, it's a...

[36:12] I'm just going to say, that's necessary, though, in case you do need to save a prostitute Jodie Foster from Harvey Gytel on Venus.

[36:19] Let's say you get to Venus, you really make a connection with this young lady, and you've got to save her from the people who are exploiting her.

[36:26] You need that laser.

Dan McCoy

[36:27] So, I get it.

[36:28] I understand.

[36:28] Man, are from Mars.

[36:29] Jodie Foster is from Venus.

[36:31] I know.

Alex Smith

[36:31] Yeah.

[36:32] That's the way it goes.

[36:33] Exactly.

[36:34] Now, it also has a flamethrower.

Elliott Kalan

[36:37] You need it.

[36:38] You need it on Venus, because it's not hot enough there.

Alex Smith

[36:40] Yeah.

[36:41] Yeah, that doesn't seem super thought out.

[36:43] Tell you what you need on Venus.

Elliott Kalan

[36:44] You need a water thrower.

Alex Smith

[36:48] Like, yeah, some sort of ice propulsion thing like Sub-Zero has or something.

Elliott Kalan

[36:52] Yeah, yeah, exactly.

[36:53] Or Scorpion.

[36:54] Throw a spear at somebody.

[36:54] Get over here.

[36:55] Yeah, magic ice.

[36:56] Yeah.

Alex Smith

[36:57] I mean, well, here's the thing.

[36:58] The thing that this guy has been brought on to...

[37:02] Because they want to make the suit absolutely.

[37:04] They want to make it the space suit of the future.

[37:07] And one of the things that he discusses putting in it right away, and this is our lead guy, Robert Urich, discusses.

[37:15] Spencer.

[37:16] He's going to make it so that when you put this suit on and you look at something, you can see whether it is human or not and whether it is benign or not.

[37:27] So, like, it'll tell you if you're looking...

[37:29] Oh, Wastel can read motives.

[37:29] Sure.

[37:30] Yes.

[37:30] Yeah.

[37:31] There's a moment where he's talking about, and he says it's mostly reading auras at this point.

[37:37] And it's amazing.

Stuart Wellington

[37:38] I think that's like an early level cleric spell.

[37:42] Yeah.

[37:43] Yeah.

Alex Smith

[37:43] So, it's a magic suit that's heat resistant.

[37:46] Might come in handy later on, you know, in this movie.

[37:50] And it can see whether someone is human or not and whether they're evil or not.

[37:55] We meet the guy's secretary who tries to give him a binder with some secret information or something.

[38:01] She soon gets fired and disappears because she tries to do that.

[38:06] There's a bunch of stuff about the family getting pressured.

[38:10] Oh, we meet the boss of the company, which is Kevin McCarthy.

[38:15] McCartney?

Elliott Kalan

[38:16] McCarthy from Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

Dan McCoy

[38:18] Yeah, that's right.

[38:19] And, yeah, it's a good life segment of Twilight Zone, the movie.

[38:24] Yeah, yeah.

Alex Smith

[38:24] Uh-huh.

[38:25] And UHF, right?

[38:26] He's the guy in UHF.

[38:27] That's Weird Al.

Stuart Wellington

[38:35] Got it in one, Elliot.

[38:38] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[38:40] If you're thinking about a normal Al, just, you know, dial up the weird by at least 50%.

Elliott Kalan

[38:44] Well, that's the way...

[38:45] I remember when Weird Al was not famous yet.

[38:47] They'd have to introduce him at shows and they'd go, let us prepare you for what you're about to see.

[38:51] We've all known Al's, but what if they were a little weird?

[38:57] Get ready.

[38:58] Now that you're prepared and you understand the premise of his bit for Weird Al.

[39:04] And they didn't always call him Weird Al Yankovic at the time, but Weird Al.

Dan McCoy

[39:07] They're like, normal Al's are always singing the top hits of the day.

[39:11] But what if those Al's who sang top hits were weird?

[39:15] The hits would be weird too.

[39:17] Here they are.

[39:18] Weird Al.

Elliott Kalan

[39:18] A normal instrument for an Al to play would be like a guitar or a trumpet.

[39:23] But this Al's a little weird and he plays an accordion.

[39:27] Okay, let that rest in your mind a moment so you're used to it.

[39:31] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[39:32] You've already beat it, but what if it was slightly different and we took a letter away?

Alex Smith

[39:39] He's always misunderstanding what songs are about.

[39:42] That's what's weird about him.

[39:43] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[39:44] I would love it if it turned out Weird Al was not writing those songs, but he thought

[39:47] he was doing accurate covers.

[39:49] And what's weird about him is his hearing is such that he thinks those are the lyrics to

[39:52] the songs.

[39:52] Yeah.

[39:53] Yes.

[39:53] He's like, I don't get it.

[39:54] People put me in the humor section.

[39:56] Each of these covers is with respect and almost totally identical to the original song, including

[40:01] the lyrics.

Alex Smith

[40:03] I'm also one of the few successful cover musicians in history.

[40:07] And I don't know why that is.

Dan McCoy

[40:08] I don't know why I've had a multi-decade career just covering the top hits of the day, but

[40:15] hey, man, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Elliott Kalan

[40:18] I guess it's because I stay current.

Alex Smith

[40:21] Yeah.

[40:22] He moves with the times.

[40:24] And you love that.

[40:24] You love to see that.

Elliott Kalan

[40:25] I don't sing my bologna anymore.

[40:27] Not a parody song, but my understanding of the actual song that they sang.

Stuart Wellington

[40:34] Now, Amish Paradise is a real reach.

Elliott Kalan

[40:38] I said, why is Coolio singing about the Amish?

[40:43] I don't know, but I love it anyway, and I want to show my love of it by just making this

[40:48] tribute to him a totally note-for-note, word-for-word cover that is not different from the original

[40:54] in any way.

Dan McCoy

[40:55] With an accurate music video that just depicts the things that already occurred in his lyrics.

[41:01] I don't even know why I'm called.

[41:02] So I called up Coolio.

[41:03] Sorry.

Elliott Kalan

[41:04] Go ahead.

[41:04] I don't even know why I'm called Weird Al.

[41:05] I should be called Accurate Al.

[41:07] But you were saying, so he called up Coolio.

Alex Smith

[41:09] He called up Coolio, and he said, hey, can I do this?

[41:12] And Coolio famously said, yes, over the phone.

[41:15] Please do it.

Elliott Kalan

[41:17] Please.

[41:17] I love it.

[41:18] And then Weird Al's friends finally prevail on him to get hearing aids, and he's listening

[41:22] to his back catalog, and he's going, oh, God.

[41:24] Oh, God.

Dan McCoy

[41:25] No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

[41:29] I've offended so, I have so many apology notes to write.

[41:33] Dear Coolio.

Elliott Kalan

[41:35] And I just say, even if it's an apology note, if you're getting to write Dear Coolio, then

[41:40] you've made it in life.

[41:41] I don't know what else you wanted to achieve.

[41:43] You're like Alexander crying because there's no more kingdoms left to conquer.

[41:47] Yeah.

[41:49] My dearest Coolio, I must take weird pen and weird hands to write you this apology.

Stuart Wellington

[41:56] Dear Coolio, the front is terrible.

[41:59] Someday.

[41:59] The Germans have pushed us back.

Dan McCoy

[42:02] Someday these terrible song wars will be over.

Alex Smith

[42:06] So at some point in all of this, we meet one of the shittier neighborhood kids.

[42:12] Comes over.

[42:14] And that's when we start to get an impression that something is really wrong here.

[42:18] Sure.

[42:19] You know, because one of the kids comes over and it's not Tom's kids.

[42:23] It's a different kid.

[42:24] And he's very, like, mean.

[42:26] And he's very, like, aggressive.

[42:28] And he loses playing one of the son's, like, computer games.

[42:33] And he throws the little computer console thing on the ground and stomps on it because he loses.

[42:38] And that's when we get the impression that there's, like, some pod people thing.

[42:42] Type thing going on.

Elliott Kalan

[42:43] I mean, that's just a thing kids do, though, right?

[42:45] Is they get mad and they break stuff.

[42:47] Yeah.

Alex Smith

[42:48] Yeah, sure.

[42:49] Okay.

[42:50] Maybe I'm reading too much into it then.

[42:52] Maybe everything's going to be fine.

Elliott Kalan

[42:54] I'm not faulting you.

[42:55] I'm faulting the film at not understanding that kids break stuff all the time.

[42:58] Sure.

[42:59] I'm saying invitation to hell, you're burnt.

[43:01] Anyway, continue, Alex.

Alex Smith

[43:03] Yeah.

[43:04] So then there's a near accident between the whole family and Susan Lucci in her limousine.

[43:10] Did she get a new driver or is she driving it herself?

[43:12] Yeah.

[43:13] She has a new driver.

[43:15] She also has, like, there's some cops that come out and immediately defend her and, like,

[43:19] and hustle Matt away when he tries to get her insurance information and stuff.

Elliott Kalan

[43:24] What if it was the same driver and he's still all melted, but he's like, it's a great job.

[43:29] The benefits are really good.

[43:30] I can't leave it.

[43:31] You know, you got to allow for mistakes from the boss every now and then.

Alex Smith

[43:35] He's just tugging on little strings with his few muscles that he has left.

Stuart Wellington

[43:40] I mean, on one hand, that's a happier ending than, like, just shots of him in his apartment

[43:46] having lost his job and being all melty and, like, not being able to make ends meet.

Elliott Kalan

[43:51] Well, but then he's like, oh, maybe it's time to rethink my career.

[43:54] I wasn't enjoying being a driver anyway.

[43:56] No, you're right.

[43:56] I always wanted to be a teacher.

[43:58] Maybe it's time to get my degree.

[44:00] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[44:00] No, you're right.

[44:01] That's better for him, I think.

[44:03] Yeah, yeah, I think so.

Alex Smith

[44:04] Then they just roll him into a high school classroom in an aquarium at some point and he teaches.

[44:10] Yep, a back to tank.

[44:11] A beautiful story.

[44:12] It's called Dangerous Melts.

[44:18] Since the dawn of time, screenwriters have taken months to craft their stories.

[44:23] But now, three Hollywood professionals shall attempt the impossible.

Stuart Wellington

[44:28] Break a story in one hour.

[44:31] That's right.

[44:31] Here on Story Break, I, Freddie Wong, Matt Arnold, and Will Campos, the creators behind

[44:36] award-winning shows like Video Game High School, have one hour to turn a humble idea into an

[44:40] awesome movie.

[44:41] Now, an awesome movie starts with an awesome title.

[44:43] I chose The Billionaire's Marriage Valley.

[44:46] Mine was Christmas Pregnant Paradise.

[44:49] Okay, next we need a protagonist.

[44:50] So I've heard Wario best described as libertarian Mario.

Alex Smith

[44:54] And of course, every great movie needs a stellar pitch.

Stuart Wellington

[44:58] In order to get to heaven, sometimes you've got to raise a little hell.

[45:00] Oh, that's the tagline!

Alex Smith

[45:02] Check out Story Break every week on MaximumFun.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

Jordan Morris

[45:08] Hey, I'm Jordan Morris, creator of the MaxFun scripted sci-fi comedy podcast, Bubble.

[45:14] We just released a special episode of Bubble to celebrate the launch of our new graphic novel.

[45:19] At SF Sketch Fest in 2019, we recorded a live show with Alison Becker, Eliza Skitter, Mike Mitchell,

[45:25] Stella Alonzo, and special guests, Jean Grey, Jonathan Colton, Jesse Thorne, Nick Weiger,

[45:30] and a bunch of other cool folks.

Alex Smith

[45:33] We suspect he'll show signs of mutation when in a state of excitement.

Jordan Morris

[45:36] Now, Annie matched with him on Tinder, so she's going to act as the honeypot.

[45:42] I do enjoy being called a honeypot.

Alex Smith

[45:45] Hey, you know what's better than honey?

[45:48] Gravy.

[45:49] Oh yeah, can I be the gravy sack?

Jordan Morris

[45:52] Out now on MaximumFun.org and wherever you get podcasts.

[45:56] And pick up the graphic novel at your local bookstore today.

Dan McCoy

[46:02] Hi there.

[46:03] The Flophouse is sponsored in part by Squarespace.

[46:07] With Squarespace, you can turn your cool idea into a new website.

[46:11] You can blog or publish content.

[46:13] You can sell products and services of all kinds and much, much more.

[46:18] How does Squarespace help you do that?

[46:20] Well, it gives you beautiful, customizable templates created by world-class designers.

[46:25] Everything optimized for mobile right out of the box.

[46:28] A new way to buy domains and choose from over 200 extensions.

[46:32] Free and secure hosting.

[46:34] You know, if Elliot were here, I'm recording this a little after the show.

[46:37] If Elliot were here, this is where he'd be like,

[46:39] Hey Dan, I got an idea for a website.

[46:42] Can Squarespace help me?

[46:43] And I'd be like, yeah.

[46:44] And he'd be like, oh, it's called Evite to Hell.

[46:48] If Susan Lucci wants you to go to hell and you don't want to go to the post office,

[46:55] you can either use stamps.com or you can use Evite to Hell and see whether you want to go to hell.

[47:04] And you can see which of your other friends are going to hell.

[47:07] You know, you always want to check to see if you're going to have friends in hell before you decide whether you're going to go to hell too.

[47:14] But if you're interested in any of this, not my idea, but in Squarespace, go to squarespace.com slash flop for a free trial.

[47:23] And when you're ready to launch, use the offer code flop to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.

[47:30] Now back to the show.

Alex Smith

[47:36] So, yeah, so we find out Susan Lucci's name is Jessica Jones.

[47:41] Oh, that's Jessica Jones.

[47:44] So it's an MCU title.

[47:45] She's apparently very powerful.

[47:47] Yeah.

[47:48] We meet these shady cops.

[47:49] We find out that she's very powerful.

[47:50] She knows all of the Winslow family by name.

[47:54] And she knows a lot about them.

[47:55] And she starts to plant the seed that she wants them to join Steaming Springs Country Club.

[48:01] The next thing that I think we see is Tom and his family, the only other, like, normal people that we know in this town.

[48:08] They are standing there in Steaming Springs doing the ritual to join the country club, which is they're standing in front of a big, huge, steaming door that has rock walls on either side of it.

[48:22] Like, it's a cave.

[48:24] And there's a ritual where Susan Lucci makes them say things like, they have to say something like, I forsake, oh, do you forsake all for the club?

[48:35] And they go, yes, we forsake all for the club.

[48:37] They essentially sell their souls to the devil to join this country club.

[48:42] And then they step into the doors and all this steam is pouring out and it's clearly very hot in there.

[48:48] And that's what the Steaming Spring is.

[48:50] It's apparently hell, right?

[48:52] The titular invitation to hell.

[48:54] Sounds cool to me.

[48:56] Yeah.

[48:56] And then, so, Susan Lucci comes to the, comes to Micro Digitech.

[49:01] She wants to talk to Matt again.

[49:03] And she wants to see the top secret suit that he's making.

[49:06] And, and the boss makes him do it.

[49:11] So he takes her in there and there's a moment where we see from the point of view of the helmet, he's just got the helmet sitting on the, on the, like a table there.

[49:19] And we see the helmet, see her.

[49:22] And the helmet says, non-human, malignant.

[49:26] Oh no.

[49:26] Amazing.

[49:28] Amazing, right?

[49:29] So Matt comes back to work the next day, got a new secretary.

[49:34] A secretary's been disposed of.

[49:36] And, and Tom has been promoted.

[49:39] So Tom is now at a higher, a higher up the company.

[49:42] We meet him.

[49:43] He, we meet him again.

[49:45] He seems like weird and off and grumpy for just a second.

[49:49] But then pretty quickly he turns back into his cool self and he tries to convince Matt to join the country club.

[49:56] So it's like kind of unclear.

[49:58] They don't, they don't become like soulless husks.

[50:02] You know, there, there's clearly like some, there's still, there's still themselves to some degree, even though they've been taken over by this, whatever this thing is.

[50:11] Right.

[50:12] This evil force.

Elliott Kalan

[50:13] Even though they've forsaken all, there's still like a little bit left.

Alex Smith

[50:17] Now we, we find out Tom's wife has a new car, which seems like kind of unnecessary, but it, but it does, it matters at a certain point later in the film.

[50:24] Cause this is a very smart film.

[50:26] Again, the Tom's kids come over for a slumber party.

[50:30] We find out that they're shitty now.

[50:32] They're like the other shitty kid.

[50:33] Apparently it's worse than kids with what happens to them.

[50:36] Yeah.

[50:37] And this is revealed in a very funny scene.

[50:39] Great scene where Robert Urich hears the TV on in the middle of the night during the slumber party.

[50:45] And he comes down the stairs and he sees that someone is watching the kind of footage that you see in like, you know, like in fifth element when they're showing her all the, all the tragedies of the past or whatever.

[50:57] It's basically just like on the street wartime.

[50:59] Yeah.

[51:00] Footage.

Dan McCoy

[51:01] Something really traumatizing.

[51:02] We're putting together a montage of like the greatest hits of like lousy things happening.

Alex Smith

[51:08] Yeah.

[51:08] Well, I don't know.

[51:09] I don't even know that it's a montage.

[51:11] It's more just like riot footage or war footage or something like that.

[51:13] I don't know how much it is a montage, but it goes on for a while.

[51:16] And he comes down and he sees just one kid.

[51:19] It's very creepy.

[51:20] Shot well.

[51:21] It's great.

[51:22] It's a, you know, Wes Craven.

[51:23] And he's a, and this kid is, you see the kid backlit in this chair, just staring at the TV.

[51:29] It's one of Tom's kids.

[51:30] And he comes, he comes down and he says, you shouldn't be Robert Urich comes down.

[51:35] He says, you shouldn't be watching this.

[51:37] He turns it off and he turns and the kid has like a big smile on his face.

[51:40] Like he's like, he's watching a war and he's enjoying it or whatever.

[51:44] Right.

[51:45] And he just goes, you shouldn't have done that.

[51:49] So Matt is freaked out about the club.

[51:52] He doesn't really like the idea of the country club, but his wife really wants to join.

[51:55] The kids really want to join.

[51:56] And we, I think at some point we go to the country club and we see it.

[52:01] There's a lot of beautiful people there in bikinis and otherwise.

[52:05] So like parkas?

[52:07] Mm-hmm.

[52:08] Yeah.

[52:08] Bikinis and parkas.

[52:10] They're wearing like, if you opened a book of different outfits, they're wearing like every

[52:14] available outfit.

[52:15] There's two people in a horse costume.

Stuart Wellington

[52:17] Got it.

[52:17] Okay.

[52:18] Yeah.

[52:19] Mm-hmm.

[52:20] At one point.

[52:21] You unlocked all the cosmetic upgrades for the game.

[52:24] Yeah.

[52:24] And you just want to use them all.

[52:25] So you can just wear whatever you want.

[52:26] Sure.

Alex Smith

[52:26] Yeah.

[52:27] Totally.

[52:28] So the boss at one point says the great line, or no, Robert Urich goes to his boss to complain

[52:35] about the fact that his secretary has been fired.

[52:38] And there's a really, another really great, I only bring the scene up because there's two

[52:41] really great lines in it.

[52:42] One is that the boss goes, she just wasn't company timber.

[52:47] And Robert Urich does the dramatic thing where he stands up from his chair and turns around,

[52:52] you know, and he goes, timber, are we talking about people or trees?

[53:00] And then at the end of that scene.

[53:01] That's how you know he cares.

Elliott Kalan

[53:02] That's a great line.

[53:03] Yeah.

[53:04] That's a genuinely great line.

Alex Smith

[53:06] Really, really good.

[53:07] Really good.

[53:08] So, and then at the end of that scene, the boss.

[53:12] Bruce Frankston.

[53:12] At the end of that scene, Bruce Frankston pops in and goes, ha!

[53:19] Ooh!

[53:20] Ooh!

[53:20] Ah!

Elliott Kalan

[53:22] We can't afford that, Elliot.

Dan McCoy

[53:28] Come on.

Elliott Kalan

[53:29] Sorry.

[53:29] I mean, I'll change a little bit again so it's more affordable.

[53:31] Da-na-da-da-da-da.

Dan McCoy

[53:35] At the end of that scene.

[53:36] Da-na-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da.

[53:39] Yep.

Elliott Kalan

[53:41] Everybody's got an invitation to hell.

[53:44] Everybody wants an invitation to hell.

Alex Smith

[53:47] I don't know the rest of the song.

[53:47] Oh, my God.

[53:48] Oh, my God.

[53:49] This could be really good.

[53:51] That could be really good.

[53:52] We should do that and tag it on the end of this episode.

[53:55] Yeah, sure, sure.

[53:56] Just do it.

[53:57] So, the boss, meaning Kevin McCarthy.

[54:01] Sure.

[54:01] As Bruce Springsteen, yes.

[54:04] He says the line, as Robert Urich's walking out, he says the line, we just want you to be

[54:09] one of us.

[54:10] Oh.

[54:11] One of us.

[54:12] Google Gobble.

Elliott Kalan

[54:14] But he's making a Ramones reference, not a Freak's reference.

[54:17] Not a Freak's reference.

[54:18] That's the other thing.

[54:20] He doesn't know where it came from.

[54:21] He doesn't know the original version of it.

[54:25] That's the scary part.

[54:27] That our film culture is disappearing so rapidly.

Alex Smith

[54:33] So, one thing I forgot to mention.

[54:35] At the country club, when they go to the country club, Robert Urich, while he's on the tour,

[54:40] he hears a woman screaming in what he thinks is pain or for help.

[54:47] And he goes and he sees the door that Tom and his family walked through early.

[54:52] And there's all this steam billowing out from under the door.

[54:55] It's a steamy valley.

[54:57] Mm-hmm.

[54:58] And he puts his hand on the door and he goes, ah!

[55:00] Like, freaks out.

[55:01] Because it's hot.

[55:02] Right now.

Elliott Kalan

[55:02] One, two, three, four.

Stuart Wellington

[55:04] Da-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na.

Elliott Kalan

[55:08] Everybody's got an invitation to hell.

[55:12] Because punks like us, baby, we're invited to hell.

[55:17] Do-do-do-do-do.

[55:19] Invitations, pow, pow.

[55:21] They'll take you to hell.

[55:23] Invitations.

Alex Smith

[55:26] The thing I neglected to mention is that, much like Jonathan Richman in There's Something

[55:31] About Mary, Bruce Springsteen just pops up regularly with a guitar.

[55:36] Is that like one of the heights?

[55:37] Throughout the whole movie.

Elliott Kalan

[55:38] I mean, not that he's fallen.

[55:39] I mean, he's the man who brought back Broadway.

[55:41] But, you know, this was really at one of his high peaks, you know?

[55:45] Yeah.

Alex Smith

[55:46] Yeah, yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[55:48] Invited to hell.

[55:50] I was invited to hell.

Alex Smith

[55:55] That one took, the melody on that one took me a second.

[55:58] Yeah, yeah.

[55:59] It's hard.

Elliott Kalan

[55:59] I mean, I'm going to blame Bruce Springsteen for that.

[56:01] Because it is not, it's a catchy song, but it's not a natural song.

[56:04] And that's, I can't think of too many other Bruce Springsteen songs.

[56:07] So, we're done now.

[56:09] Yeah.

Alex Smith

[56:10] Okay.

[56:10] So, when he touches the hot door.

[56:13] Everybody's getting invited to hell.

Dan McCoy

[56:14] Ba-da-da-na-na-na-na.

[56:16] Now we're going down and going to hell.

[56:19] Ba-da-da-da-na-na.

Stuart Wellington

[56:20] All right.

[56:21] Anyway.

[56:21] Sorry.

[56:21] Go on.

Elliott Kalan

[56:23] 57 channels invitation to hell.

[56:26] 57 channels invitation to hell.

[56:29] I thought of another one.

[56:31] Yeah.

Alex Smith

[56:34] So, the, uh, Susan Lucci catches him trying to open the hot door, aside from obviously being

[56:40] a door to hell.

[56:40] Come on up, invitation.

Elliott Kalan

[56:43] Come on up, invitation to hell.

[56:46] Na-na-na-na-na-na-na.

[56:49] Anyway, I thought of another one.

[56:50] We went down to hell.

[56:53] Into hell.

[56:54] Into hell we dive.

Alex Smith

[56:58] Okay.

[56:58] Sorry.

[56:59] Stuart is good.

[56:59] I think it would be an into hell we were invited.

[57:02] Oh, yeah.

[57:03] Yeah.

[57:03] Right.

[57:06] To hell we were invite.

[57:08] Yep.

[57:10] So, uh, this door to hell.

[57:13] Rived up like a doose.

[57:14] And invited to hell.

Elliott Kalan

[57:17] Invited into hell.

Alex Smith

[57:20] I've been trying to figure out how to invite Rosalita to hell.

Elliott Kalan

[57:24] Rosalita invite you to hell.

[57:26] Or something like that.

[57:27] Yeah.

Alex Smith

[57:28] Uh, so the, uh, so this door to, these double doors to hell.

[57:32] The double doors to hell.

[57:33] That are very hot.

[57:35] Have a little.

[57:36] Double door to hell.

[57:37] Yeah.

[57:37] Have a little like, uh, like, you know, uh, one of those like, uh, they have a keypad.

[57:43] That just sticks up out of the ground.

[57:45] He's been invited down to hell.

Stuart Wellington

[57:48] Do, do, do, do, do, do.

[57:50] Uh, that's the one.

Elliott Kalan

[57:52] Can't go to hell without an invite.

Alex Smith

[57:55] This.

[57:56] Uh, and Robert, Robert Urick tries to open the doors to hell by punching the keypad that's

[58:01] there on its own little like sort of podium that sticks up.

[58:04] That's what you would do.

[58:05] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[58:06] Hopefully more of the keys, hopefully more of the keys work than Alex's keyboard.

[58:11] Oh, wow.

[58:12] Oh.

Elliott Kalan

[58:13] That's right.

[58:14] It's the Flophouse roast of Alex's keyboard with your roast master general, Stuart Wellington.

[58:20] Stuart.

Stuart Wellington

[58:27] I don't know what to say that hasn't already been said about his keyboard.

Elliott Kalan

[58:39] I've heard of off key, but off board.

Dan McCoy

[58:43] I wouldn't press command function with B.

[58:50] Arthur's keyboard.

[58:52] It's the Arthur's keyboard.

Alex Smith

[58:57] So Susan Lucci catches him trying to open this door.

[59:00] He's trying to save a woman that he thinks is probably in like a fire or something.

[59:04] Yeah.

[59:04] And he says, oh, I thought I, she said, you must be lost.

[59:07] And he says, well, I thought I heard a woman cry out needing help.

[59:11] And she, and Susan Lucci gets super horned up real fast and says, you know, people can cry

[59:17] out for other things as well, for pleasure.

[59:19] And, and by the way, this country club can be a place of great pleasure.

[59:23] And if you join, I can make this a great pleasurable experience for you.

[59:27] Clearly meaning, you know, doors open.

[59:29] Yeah.

[59:30] Unlimited buffet.

[59:31] So.

Stuart Wellington

[59:32] I've been to a country club before.

[59:35] I know what she's getting at.

Elliott Kalan

[59:36] Yeah.

[59:37] I get it.

[59:38] Ice cream on your birthday.

Stuart Wellington

[59:42] Midnight, midnight buffet.

Elliott Kalan

[59:44] Yeah, I get it.

[59:45] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[59:45] Sure, sure.

[59:45] A free hour at the driving range.

[59:49] Water slides.

Elliott Kalan

[59:50] Yeah.

[59:51] Gotcha.

[59:52] A hundred percent.

Alex Smith

[59:55] So he's really freaked out by the idea of an all you can eat buffet and free hour of

[1:00:01] golf.

[1:00:01] And he runs out.

Elliott Kalan

[1:00:03] He's like, what they don't tell you is you got to reserve the course like three weeks

[1:00:06] ahead of time.

[1:00:07] You can't just stop by and claim your free hour of golf.

[1:00:12] Sure, the driving range is open, but it's not the same.

[1:00:16] So he runs out.

[1:00:18] I can't hit balls off the roof of my house.

[1:00:20] I need to pay a membership fee for that.

[1:00:22] Give me the course.

[1:00:23] Give me the links.

Alex Smith

[1:00:25] Yeah.

[1:00:26] He runs out and his wife shows up and says that he needs to come back because Jessica's

[1:00:35] invited them all to lunch.

[1:00:36] And he says, I don't want to do this.

[1:00:39] I don't want to join this place.

[1:00:40] I don't want to be here.

[1:00:42] And he leaves and she freaks out and is mad at him.

[1:00:46] And then it cuts to them at the whole family at home, except for him, worried that he's

[1:00:50] not even going to come home, which seems.

[1:00:52] So they didn't even get lunch.

Elliott Kalan

[1:00:55] I guess they didn't.

[1:00:56] I guess they didn't go to lunch.

[1:00:57] I mean, I guess the whole family except him went to lunch and they, you know, they got

[1:01:00] him some and they put it in like a plastic container, but it's, it's just, they forgot

[1:01:03] to put it in the fridge.

[1:01:04] So it's just been a like coleslaw salad sandwich just sitting out all day.

[1:01:08] He's not going to eat that.

[1:01:09] That's not fair.

Dan McCoy

[1:01:10] Coleslaw salad sandwich?

Elliott Kalan

[1:01:11] It's the specialty at the country club, Dan.

[1:01:13] It was invented by one of the members.

Dan McCoy

[1:01:16] Coleslaw salad sandwich.

[1:01:18] Coleslaw salad.

[1:01:19] What we do is we take, we take a pastrami sandwich.

[1:01:25] Go on.

[1:01:26] We remove the pastrami.

[1:01:28] Keep talking.

[1:01:29] We triple the coleslaw.

[1:01:30] Uh-huh.

[1:01:31] Pastrami goes in the garbage.

[1:01:32] And we add an extra slab of coleslaw.

Elliott Kalan

[1:01:35] And then what we do is we drizzle it with coleslaw and we put on a coleslaw aioli, which

[1:01:41] just means more coleslaw.

Stuart Wellington

[1:01:43] See, the thing is, you hear coleslaw salad sandwich, you obviously think the coleslaw is in the middle.

[1:01:48] No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

[1:01:49] The coleslaw is the bread.

[1:01:50] Yeah.

[1:01:51] It's like the double down with coleslaw.

Dan McCoy

[1:01:53] You put it between two compressed slabs of coleslaw.

[1:01:57] Yes.

[1:01:57] That's what makes it a salad rather than just a sandwich.

[1:02:00] Yeah, you gotta eat it fast.

Stuart Wellington

[1:02:01] You go through a lot of dry ice to freeze the coleslaw into bricks.

[1:02:06] But it's worth it.

Alex Smith

[1:02:08] I was thinking they'd be fried into like latkes or something.

[1:02:12] No, we're a lot of countries around here.

Elliott Kalan

[1:02:15] So the-

[1:02:17] Our country club doesn't admit those kinds of people.

[1:02:20] We prefer to freeze our coleslaw into slabs.

[1:02:25] Thank you.

Alex Smith

[1:02:27] Yeah.

[1:02:28] So the-

[1:02:29] So he-

[1:02:30] But he comes-

[1:02:30] So they're all sitting around the table, bummed out because daddy ran away or whatever.

[1:02:34] Oh, but belly's full of coleslaw.

[1:02:35] They don't-

[1:02:36] That's not something you can regret.

[1:02:38] Yeah.

[1:02:38] Yeah, they're all obviously working their way through a-

[1:02:41] Through coming down from their coleslaw high that they were on.

[1:02:45] Oh, man.

[1:02:48] And then Robert Urich returns with roses and a bottle of wine, I believe, and says,

[1:02:54] I'm so sorry, and apologizes to the wife.

[1:02:56] And they have another nice night together, and you get to really feel the love in this family once more.

[1:03:04] Before, what happens almost immediately after that, which is after talking to Susan Lucci one more time, the mother and the two kids decide they're going to join the club anyway.

[1:03:16] Without-

[1:03:17] Right.

[1:03:17] Robert Urich.

[1:03:18] Makes sense.

[1:03:18] Yeah.

[1:03:19] So there's a scene where there's a-

[1:03:21] When they do that?

[1:03:22] Are they allowed to do that?

[1:03:24] Well, it's funny.

[1:03:26] You should ask that question because Susan Lucci says, I know there's a rule against people joining the club without their whole families, but we're going to make an exception for you because Susan Lucci is smart.

[1:03:36] She's figured out this is the only way she's going to get Robert Urich on board.

[1:03:38] Oh, I see.

[1:03:39] As if she gets the kids and the mom already in there.

Stuart Wellington

[1:03:42] They pull that shit at the Park Slope food co-op all the time.

Dan McCoy

[1:03:46] Spencer for hire.

[1:03:48] Spencer not required.

[1:03:50] That's-

[1:03:50] Oh.

[1:03:51] Wow.

[1:03:52] Whoa, does she say that, Alex?

[1:03:53] Did they say that?

[1:03:54] Did she say that?

[1:03:55] Did they say that?

Alex Smith

[1:03:57] That's not a line from the-

[1:03:58] Is it implied?

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:59] It better be.

[1:04:00] Or it's like a-

[1:04:01] You better see that glint in her eyes.

[1:04:03] That means she's thinking it.

Alex Smith

[1:04:03] It's an off-screen ad lib that they added in post.

[1:04:07] So then everything goes crazy at that point, right?

[1:04:12] Not like the end of society.

[1:04:15] Yes, exactly like that.

[1:04:16] Basically, from that point on, just imagine the end of society.

[1:04:21] But for TV, so it's elbows and stuff, not asses.

[1:04:27] Interesting.

Dan McCoy

[1:04:32] That's also you pitching your G-rated pornography.

Elliott Kalan

[1:04:37] Imagine, it's elbows, not asses.

[1:04:40] You think it's something, but it's elbows, so it's okay.

[1:04:44] It's all just elbows.

Stuart Wellington

[1:04:45] Yeah, that's why the Charmin Bears are always talking about having fucking toilet papers stuck to their elbows.

[1:04:51] Yeah.

[1:04:52] It's like, I don't know, Breast Craven.

[1:04:54] It seems like it's not the best-

Elliott Kalan

[1:04:55] It doesn't seem like it's the best use of your talents.

[1:04:58] No, this is where it's all going.

[1:04:59] This is where the market is going.

Dan McCoy

[1:05:00] Elbow Angels 47.

Alex Smith

[1:05:03] So from this point on, everything that happens is pretty clearly a result of the fact that his family is now in hell, and they've been replaced with some kind of pod people.

[1:05:14] Because the wife is suddenly, like, I don't know, hornier, like, more mean-spirited.

[1:05:22] Yeah.

[1:05:22] The dog, they have a dog named Albert.

[1:05:26] The dog, he comes home after the family has joined the country club and gone through the door.

[1:05:32] Oh, by the way, when they joined the country club, the little daughter, the youngest one, freaks out at the last minute and decides she doesn't want to.

[1:05:38] But Susan Lucci grabs her and forces her to go through the doors.

[1:05:41] Oh.

[1:05:42] Very sad.

[1:05:44] Now, the-

[1:05:45] Oh, and every time a family goes through the doors, the doors close, and then there's a security guard that walks up and, like, stands with his back to the door while it's happening.

[1:05:54] Security guard to hell.

[1:05:56] Yeah, he's like the bouncer.

[1:05:56] He's like the one minimum wage guy they got.

[1:05:59] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:06:00] Hell has a bouncer, apparently.

[1:06:02] People are just dying to get in, except they're not.

[1:06:05] Nobody wants to go there usually, right?

[1:06:07] He's wearing a Wilson's leather jacket.

Alex Smith

[1:06:10] That should be a Bruce Springsteen song.

[1:06:12] Hell has a bouncer.

[1:06:13] Yeah.

[1:06:14] Yeah.

[1:06:14] But, so, and Elliot, do you want to sing that for a minute?

[1:06:19] Did you know that there's a bouncer to hell?

Elliott Kalan

[1:06:21] There's a bouncer at the doorway to hell.

[1:06:25] Better hope your name is on his clipboard, or else you'll be escorted out by the bouncer hell.

[1:06:32] Oh, no!

Dan McCoy

[1:06:33] But that would be better than going to hell.

[1:06:37] So I guess you don't want to be on the list of hell.

Alex Smith

[1:06:41] He realizes midway through the chorus.

[1:06:44] He's like, oh wait, the premise of this song.

[1:06:46] Oh wait.

[1:06:46] Hold on.

[1:06:47] You actually don't want to be on the bouncer to hell's list.

[1:06:51] So the, the, so here's sort of what.

Elliott Kalan

[1:06:54] Bouncer to hell, doo, doo, doo, doo.

[1:06:55] He'll pass you by, bouncer to hell.

[1:06:59] If you're lucky, I guess.

[1:07:01] Bouncer to hell.

Dan McCoy

[1:07:02] Bouncer to hell.

[1:07:05] Yep.

Elliott Kalan

[1:07:06] Have I ever heard a Bruce Springsteen song?

[1:07:08] Possibly not.

[1:07:08] I don't, I don't know.

[1:07:11] Punks like us.

[1:07:12] Baby, we're the bouncers to hell.

[1:07:15] Doo, doo, doo, doo, doo.

[1:07:18] At night we stand by doors of fire.

[1:07:20] I think we have gone through the same like six Bruce Springsteen songs twice now.

Alex Smith

[1:07:27] Rosalita, bouncer to hell.

Dan McCoy

[1:07:31] Finally.

[1:07:31] We got it in.

[1:07:32] Yeah.

Alex Smith

[1:07:33] There we go.

[1:07:33] Great.

[1:07:34] It worked.

[1:07:35] All right.

[1:07:35] Give us our Peabody's.

Dan McCoy

[1:07:38] So as you can probably imagine.

Alex Smith

[1:07:40] Our statue's a Mr. Peabody from Rocky and Bullwinkle.

[1:07:44] As you could probably imagine, at this point, the wife is now wearing darker clothes.

[1:07:50] They were in the middle of remodeling the home to make it more, to update it, make it more modern.

[1:07:55] Suddenly, she's decided on much moodier colors for the walls.

[1:07:59] It's like a dark blue.

[1:08:00] There's very jagged, modern furniture.

[1:08:02] She kind of beetle juices the house.

[1:08:04] Yeah.

[1:08:04] Where it's like, now it's scary and modern instead of being homey.

[1:08:08] She gets rid of the old upright piano she used to play sweet songs on.

[1:08:13] And now there's a black grand piano that she's playing, I don't know, like List or something on it.

[1:08:17] You know, it's really.

Stuart Wellington

[1:08:18] She's just playing the keyboard part from that Linkin Park song.

Alex Smith

[1:08:22] Yeah.

[1:08:22] She's in there just tearing up some fiery, you know, fiery list.

[1:08:28] And the guy comes in.

[1:08:30] The dad comes in.

[1:08:31] And he sees his wife again.

[1:08:32] He starts to suspect something is wrong.

[1:08:35] I don't think he, I don't think there's too much weird that happens with the kids at this point.

[1:08:40] Mostly he's just worried about the wife because what she does is she banishes the dog to outside and won't let the dog come in because the dog is barking at them because they're all demon people or whatever.

[1:08:51] And then when he goes to work, she takes the dog to the only vet in town who is apparently not a vet.

[1:08:59] Like he's apparently not in the community that, he's not the vet that belongs to the country club because he's a normal guy.

[1:09:04] And he's.

[1:09:05] Yeah, he's not a monster.

[1:09:06] He's not a monster.

[1:09:07] She asks him to just kill the dog.

[1:09:09] And she says, I would like to be there for it.

[1:09:11] And he does.

[1:09:12] He says, I lied to her.

[1:09:13] I told her I don't do that.

[1:09:15] Which seems really weird as a vet that you wouldn't give the person the option to be there when you put down the dog.

Elliott Kalan

[1:09:19] I don't do anything with dogs, but I won't do that.

Dan McCoy

[1:09:24] I know we're stretching out into the other singers.

[1:09:28] I don't know about this.

Alex Smith

[1:09:30] I mean, with Meat Loaf, the Invitation to Hell songs are right there.

[1:09:35] Like an invitation to hell.

[1:09:37] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:09:39] That really, that would be a great Meat Loaf album name.

[1:09:43] Invitation to Hell.

Elliott Kalan

[1:09:44] Can I sleep on it and maybe go to hell in the morning.

Dan McCoy

[1:09:48] It's another Meat Loaf song.

[1:09:49] Invitation to Hell, like part two.

[1:09:52] Yeah.

Alex Smith

[1:09:54] RSVP.

[1:09:55] So the, oh.

Stuart Wellington

[1:09:56] Did I ever tell you guys that Charlene went and saw the Bat Out of Hell musical?

Elliott Kalan

[1:10:00] No.

[1:10:01] Oh, wow.

Stuart Wellington

[1:10:01] She went with a friend.

[1:10:02] Was it good?

[1:10:03] Well, she said it was simultaneously the best and worst musical she's ever seen.

[1:10:08] She'll be mad at me for telling this story on there because she probably wants to tell it.

[1:10:11] But she did say that before the end of the, before the intermission, like half the audience had already left.

[1:10:19] Oh, that's sad to hear.

[1:10:20] But it was still super fun.

Alex Smith

[1:10:23] That's, I went to one of those Zappa plays Zappa concerts.

[1:10:26] And, uh, and I went with my family and my family decided to leave after about four songs.

[1:10:31] And, uh, and I think the audience was pretty much leaving throughout the whole thing.

[1:10:36] Yeah.

[1:10:36] It was like, it was very deep.

[1:10:38] It was very deep Zappa.

[1:10:39] Nothing against that.

[1:10:40] But it was like, it was not a like general admission crowd.

[1:10:44] He wasn't playing the hits?

[1:10:46] The hits of Zappa.

[1:10:47] Yeah.

[1:10:48] There are some.

[1:10:49] I mean, there's some stuff that would, that would keep a, keep a crowd.

Dan McCoy

[1:10:51] I, uh, Yakov Shmironov was trying out a Broadway show.

[1:10:56] I don't think he'd even made it like, but like he had like a couple of, and I got some sort of, uh, you know, like I got like free tickets to the preview or whatever.

[1:11:05] What?

[1:11:06] And I had a good time.

[1:11:08] Like, you know, I went, I, you know, I went.

[1:11:10] Really?

[1:11:11] Ironically, I would say.

[1:11:12] I don't want to like, you know, like paint myself as too much of.

[1:11:16] Why is this the first time hearing you this day?

[1:11:17] You were a younger man.

[1:11:19] You were a younger man.

[1:11:19] I was a younger man.

[1:11:20] I went.

[1:11:21] Yeah.

[1:11:22] I was a, a callow man.

[1:11:23] I enjoyed the first act of it just fine.

[1:11:26] I'm like, okay, that's enough Yakov Shmironov for me.

[1:11:29] Thank you very much.

[1:11:30] I left at intermission.

[1:11:32] Oh.

[1:11:32] It was fine.

[1:11:33] Yeah.

[1:11:35] I don't know.

[1:11:35] You know, he'd been trying it out in Branson for a while.

[1:11:38] Didn't quite make it to the great white way, but, uh, you know, Yakov, he did a great first act.

[1:11:45] Keep swinging for the fences, buddy.

[1:11:47] That's what Dan says.

Elliott Kalan

[1:11:48] Not a great enough first act that you were like, I want to stay for the second act.

Dan McCoy

[1:11:51] No.

[1:11:52] I had other things to do, Elliot.

[1:11:56] Another man may not have come to any of the acts.

Elliott Kalan

[1:11:59] I guess that's true.

[1:11:59] I mean, most men did not come to, billions of them didn't go to either of the acts.

[1:12:03] Yeah.

[1:12:04] Yeah.

[1:12:06] He can't swing a dead cat in this, on this world without hitting someone who's never seen Yakov Smirnoff live.

[1:12:12] Why are you doing that?

[1:12:14] The cat likes it.

[1:12:17] What?

Stuart Wellington

[1:12:20] The ghost of the cat.

[1:12:21] Are you a necromancer?

[1:12:22] Yeah.

[1:12:22] The ghost of the cat.

Elliott Kalan

[1:12:22] It was the cat's last wishes.

[1:12:24] It was to be swung.

[1:12:25] It was to be swung around.

[1:12:26] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:12:26] To be used as a unit of measurement.

[1:12:28] I get it.

Elliott Kalan

[1:12:29] The cat said, the cat said, when I die, swing me around like one of your French girls.

[1:12:32] And I said, okay, if that's it, that's what you want.

Dan McCoy

[1:12:35] A lot of ghosts in this episode.

[1:12:37] Yeah.

Alex Smith

[1:12:37] Okay, I should mention the vet, the aforementioned vet is Bill Irwin, the guy from all of John Hughes' airports.

[1:12:44] The old man Bill Irwin, E-R-W-I-N.

Elliott Kalan

[1:12:46] Not Bill Irwin of Full Moon and things like that.

Dan McCoy

[1:12:49] Yeah, not famed clown Bill Irwin.

Elliott Kalan

[1:12:52] Not FX's Legion's Bill Irwin.

Dan McCoy

[1:12:55] Not the guy I saw at the Irish Repertory Center talking about Waiting for Godot.

[1:13:01] What?

Elliott Kalan

[1:13:02] Yeah, I wanted to see that show when it came to L.A. and I missed it.

[1:13:04] It was fun.

[1:13:05] It was fun.

[1:13:05] I've seen him perform with David Shiner a couple times.

Dan McCoy

[1:13:09] Great shows.

[1:13:10] Enough name dropping.

[1:13:12] Back to the show.

Alex Smith

[1:13:13] I should mention as a bit of, I think, very good and efficient storytelling, the vet guy's wife is his former secretary who disappeared.

[1:13:27] So while he's dealing with the vet guy and talking about his dog, he's also finding out that, one, that she got fired, two, that she was snooping around to try to find out about her nephew or something who had disappeared, and three, that she died in a car accident and the car burnt up and there's no evidence of what happened to her.

Alex Smith

[1:13:50] So the dog is out of the picture for the family, but safe at this vet who's in on its house somewhere, right?

[1:13:57] Okay.

Alex Smith

[1:13:58] Okay.

Alex Smith

[1:13:58] Okay.

[1:13:58] So there's another sex scene between Matt and Pat Winslow, and she, this time, scratches his back up.

[1:14:08] Uh-oh.

[1:14:09] Because, again, she's a devil person now.

[1:14:13] And there's a great scene where he looks in the mirror, and he's like, what's going on?

[1:14:19] And he looks at the scratches on his back, and he's like, this has never happened before.

Elliott Kalan

[1:14:25] The way you said it made it sound like he liked it, though.

Alex Smith

[1:14:28] Yeah.

[1:14:29] Like, what is going on?

[1:14:31] What's going on?

[1:14:32] Hey, I like this.

[1:14:34] I think it's a little too much for him.

[1:14:36] I think it's clearly a little too much for him.

[1:14:38] He gets in the bed.

Elliott Kalan

[1:14:38] This is a little too much for me.

[1:14:41] He says it like that.

Alex Smith

[1:14:42] Yeah.

[1:14:43] He's, like, complaining about it to his therapist later on, and he still sounds turned on.

[1:14:49] He just can't help it.

[1:14:50] Can't help it.

Elliott Kalan

[1:14:51] I need your help to process this.

[1:14:54] Yeah.

[1:14:55] Well, the way you say it makes it sound like you actually enjoyed it.

[1:14:58] No.

Alex Smith

[1:15:02] The opposite of Dave Foley's sarcastic guy character on Kids in the Hall.

[1:15:07] So he sits down on the bed, and she, as soon as they're done, she passes out, and she sleeps hard.

[1:15:14] Which is really weird, because you don't normally think, like, a damned person is good.

[1:15:17] It's like the sleep of the damned, I guess.

[1:15:19] Oh, it's like Dana from Ghostbusters.

[1:15:23] Yeah.

[1:15:24] Yeah.

[1:15:24] Okay.

[1:15:25] It could be something like that.

[1:15:26] So he turns to a huge portrait of her that he has on his bedside table that looks like it was taken the same day.

[1:15:34] And he goes, he says, did you join the club?

[1:15:39] And it cuts, it like shows her face and her eyes spring open, and she's been found out.

[1:15:44] Uh-oh.

[1:15:44] She joined the club.

[1:15:47] So I'll get, I'll just sort of, this is, sorry, gone very long.

[1:15:51] So I'll get through the end of basically what happens is, he gets found out to be very skeptical.

[1:15:59] He's snooping around at the country club.

[1:16:01] He fights the guard, the bouncer to hell.

[1:16:04] He fights that guy, kills him.

[1:16:06] What?

[1:16:06] Electrocutes him.

[1:16:07] Electrocutes him.

[1:16:08] So not a very good bouncer.

[1:16:10] Not a good bouncer at all.

Elliott Kalan

[1:16:12] Or is it like the Santa Claus, where they're like, now you're the bouncer to hell?

Alex Smith

[1:16:16] That would be great.

[1:16:18] Here we go again.

[1:16:18] That would be great if that's how the movie ended, is he's now the bouncer.

[1:16:22] He slowly just becomes like a little bit bigger.

Elliott Kalan

[1:16:27] Robert Eurich's now the bouncer to hell.

Alex Smith

[1:16:31] So now he runs back.

[1:16:33] He's now the bouncer to hell.

[1:16:36] So now he runs back to the house.

[1:16:38] And this is like, this is kind of funny at this point, how many times he's gone from club to house to club to house.

[1:16:43] But he goes, he runs back to his house.

[1:16:45] There's a very sort of funny scene where he has to fight his whole family.

[1:16:49] It's the classic dad has to fight his whole family because they're all possessed.

[1:16:53] Yeah, it's called bedtime.

Stuart Wellington

[1:16:53] And he throws his...

[1:16:54] Whoa!

[1:16:54] He throws his...

[1:16:56] Oh, shit.

Dan McCoy

[1:16:59] America's newest dad humorist.

[1:17:02] The top dad humorist, Elliot Cable.

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:04] Have you ever noticed how there are funny things about being a dad that really only dads want to hear about?

[1:17:09] Let me tell you about them.

Stuart Wellington

[1:17:11] Yeah, it's like, what's up with this hop on pop bullshit?

[1:17:15] Yeah.

[1:17:16] I'm going to flip the script on you.

[1:17:18] Time for pop on hop.

[1:17:19] Wait, what?

[1:17:20] Wait.

[1:17:22] This time Pop's doing the hopping.

Alex Smith

[1:17:24] That's just when you've had a nice IPA is your pop on hop at that point.

[1:17:30] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:31] I feel like that's Dr. Seuss with the publisher when they're trying to create a DSCU, a Dr. Seuss cinematic universe.

[1:17:37] And they're like, hop on pop too.

[1:17:39] We reverse it.

[1:17:40] Now Pop's doing the hopping.

[1:17:42] Cat in the hat.

[1:17:43] What if the hat was inside the cat?

[1:17:45] Wait, I don't know.

[1:17:46] This isn't...

[1:17:47] We've got to find new angles on these old characters.

Dan McCoy

[1:17:49] Fox?

[1:17:50] What if the socks filled out inside the fox?

[1:17:54] What?

[1:17:55] I don't even know what...

[1:17:56] That sentence didn't even make sense.

[1:17:58] It doesn't make sense.

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:58] Sam I.M.'s got amnesia.

[1:18:00] Now the other guy's got to teach him how to like green eggs and ham.

[1:18:03] You're just taking the original ones and reversing them slightly.

Dan McCoy

[1:18:05] This time the book battles the butter.

Alex Smith

[1:18:08] This is...

[1:18:09] These studio guys don't know what the fuck they're talking about.

[1:18:13] They don't know which order words are supposed to go in.

Elliott Kalan

[1:18:15] And to think that Mulberry Street saw it on me.

[1:18:18] Mm-hmm.

[1:18:22] The zoo I ran if I?

[1:18:25] Okay, now you're just taking the...

[1:18:27] Literally just the words and shuffling them a little bit.

Alex Smith

[1:18:30] So he throws...

[1:18:31] Now we tell it from the ooblex point of view.

[1:18:35] So he throws his son and his daughter in a closet.

[1:18:38] His wife comes at him with like a golf club or something.

[1:18:41] And he knocks her down and she just passes out immediately.

[1:18:44] Again, the sleep of the damned.

[1:18:45] Mm-hmm.

[1:18:46] He goes to the...

[1:18:48] He goes to microdigitech.

[1:18:50] He gets his space suit.

[1:18:51] Smart, right?

[1:18:52] He gets his space suit.

[1:18:54] Well, he did stay in a Holiday Inn Express last night.

Stuart Wellington

[1:18:56] Yeah.

[1:18:57] Yeah.

Alex Smith

[1:18:58] Tom comes in with a gun and says,

[1:19:00] We've figured out that you're not one of us.

[1:19:03] You're a loser.

[1:19:04] And I'm going to shoot you in the head.

Elliott Kalan

[1:19:06] We put the context clues together when you beat up your possessed family and killed our bouncer.

Alex Smith

[1:19:11] You're a creep.

[1:19:12] It's like every episode of Undercover Boss.

[1:19:14] What the hell are you doing here?

[1:19:15] And so by this time, Matt Winslow has the suit on and he uses the laser gun to shoot Tom.

[1:19:25] Blast him out of the room.

[1:19:27] And then he puts the helmet on.

[1:19:31] He gets Tom's car.

[1:19:32] Remember, we found out Tom had a new car.

[1:19:34] So we know this is his car.

[1:19:36] Yeah.

[1:19:36] He gets in Tom's car.

[1:19:37] He drives to the country club.

[1:19:38] Now he gets to say that he's Tom in his Halloween costume, which is the space suit.

[1:19:43] Whoa.

[1:19:44] And he goes into the Halloween party where all the higher ups, everybody who's everybody in Silicon Valley is in this Halloween party.

Stuart Wellington

[1:19:53] And they're all lined up for one laser blast.

Alex Smith

[1:19:55] The guy who's in the back.

Stuart Wellington

[1:19:57] It's a conga line.

[1:19:57] So you can just shoot straight through him.

Alex Smith

[1:19:59] Yeah.

[1:19:59] So easy.

[1:20:00] The guy who is, the guy who was in the backseat of Tom's car earlier in the film is dressed, his Halloween costume is a Nazi Halloween costume.

Stuart Wellington

[1:20:11] On the nose.

[1:20:12] A bit on the nose.

[1:20:13] Yeah.

Alex Smith

[1:20:13] A little on the nose.

[1:20:14] So he has a long conversation with him about why he's wearing the space suit.

[1:20:21] And then he looks around the room and there's no humans to be found.

[1:20:25] You see through his helmet, you see it's all non-humans.

[1:20:29] Hmm.

[1:20:30] And are they evil or not evil?

[1:20:32] Evil.

[1:20:33] They're all evil.

[1:20:34] Oh, no.

[1:20:34] Are they Knievel or not Knievel?

[1:20:37] Good question.

[1:20:38] It does not say how many of them are Knievel.

[1:20:40] They don't have that technology yet.

[1:20:43] That's a shame.

[1:20:43] That's from Mark II of the suit.

[1:20:45] Yeah.

[1:20:46] So then he runs down the stairs to go to the door to hell.

[1:20:49] And he is about, he's trying to open it.

[1:20:52] His first guess at the code for the doors of hell, what do you think it was?

[1:20:56] Six, six, six.

[1:20:58] Exactly right.

[1:20:59] He hits six, six, six.

[1:20:59] He mashes six, six, six with his big astronaut hand first thing.

[1:21:04] Luckily, they sprung for the extra large buttons.

Elliott Kalan

[1:21:07] Yeah, yeah.

Alex Smith

[1:21:08] So then he's like, he's still doing that.

[1:21:10] And Susan Lucci comes down and she's wearing like, I don't know, she's wearing like some

[1:21:14] kind of crazy witch's outfit that's bright red.

[1:21:17] She looks just possessed.

Stuart Wellington

[1:21:17] Yeah, it's the keypad that Tom Selleck sells to old people for their doors to hell.

Elliott Kalan

[1:21:22] It just said, there's just three, six buttons, a yes, a no, and operator.

[1:21:26] And that's, yeah.

Alex Smith

[1:21:27] It's the cricket wireless, no, not cricket.

[1:21:31] The jitterbug?

[1:21:32] Jitterbug.

[1:21:32] Jitterbug, yeah.

[1:21:35] So Susan Lucci comes down.

[1:21:36] She's coming through the door to attack him.

[1:21:39] And he uses the, the only time the flamethrower, I believe, is used is right now.

[1:21:44] And all it is is to create a great entrance for Susan Lucci because he just sets fire to

[1:21:48] the hallway and she just walks through it easily.

[1:21:50] It's awesome.

[1:21:50] It looks amazing.

[1:21:51] Worth it.

[1:21:52] He gets the door open.

[1:21:53] He runs through.

[1:21:54] She confronts him in, you walk into, he walks into hell.

[1:21:57] It's very clear.

[1:21:58] It's like far side hell right away.

[1:22:00] It's all stalactites and like caverns and flames and stuff.

[1:22:05] And like people going, oh, in the distance and stuff like that.

[1:22:07] But then.

[1:22:08] Better than if they're going, oh, up close.

Elliott Kalan

[1:22:10] I mean, that's not fun.

Dan McCoy

[1:22:12] And, you know, far side hell, it's filled with cows.

[1:22:15] So many cows standing up.

[1:22:16] Cows, those nerdy kids.

[1:22:18] Yeah, sure.

[1:22:19] Cavemen.

[1:22:20] Yeah, that kid with a crew cut, like with a striped shirt and glasses.

Alex Smith

[1:22:25] Far side hell is so unfair because it's just anybody who screwed up in the most absurd

[1:22:30] way just goes to hell.

Elliott Kalan

[1:22:31] A lot of people are there.

[1:22:32] They're like, I don't understand the torture.

[1:22:35] Like, I don't, I don't explain the torture to me because I don't, I'm not getting it here

[1:22:38] in far side hell.

Dan McCoy

[1:22:39] You're like, oh, if we explain the torture, we'll ruin the torture.

Elliott Kalan

[1:22:42] Explain what's tormenting about this.

[1:22:43] I can't, yeah, if I explain it, it's not going to be good.

[1:22:46] It's going to ruin it.

Stuart Wellington

[1:22:47] All their clothes are kind of fucked up.

[1:22:48] It's like, that's not that big a deal, man.

[1:22:51] Like, sometimes really nice clothes can be hell too, you know, Dan?

[1:22:56] Yeah.

[1:22:57] Like having to wear a suit every day to work.

[1:22:59] Yeah.

Alex Smith

[1:23:00] My favorite far side, my favorite far side cartoon is a hell one.

[1:23:05] And it's the one where it's two guys sitting on a bench in hell.

[1:23:08] And the one leans over to the other guy and he goes, I hate this place.

[1:23:14] It's just such a great, such a great single panel.

[1:23:17] Really, really good.

[1:23:17] Okay.

[1:23:18] So, uh, he's standing on a cliff's edge in hell and Susan Lucha comes up and confronts him.

Elliott Kalan

[1:23:23] Rest in peace, the Los Angeles area restaurant Cliff's Edge, which I was a big fan of, which

[1:23:26] closed last year.

[1:23:26] Yeah.

[1:23:27] Yeah.

[1:23:27] I'm sorry.

Alex Smith

[1:23:28] I'm very sorry to hear that.

[1:23:29] I hate a, I hate a good restaurant going under.

[1:23:31] Yeah.

[1:23:32] So, um, he looks down and he sees like, well, just thanks for bringing it up.

[1:23:35] Just thanks for reminding me, you know?

[1:23:38] Sorry.

[1:23:38] I appreciate it.

[1:23:39] He sees a, he sees a portal.

[1:23:41] Am I fired, Elliot?

[1:23:42] No, no, no.

[1:23:43] I mean, not, not, uh, you could fire, you could fire me at this point.

Elliott Kalan

[1:23:46] We are firing you, but only because you handed that binder or tried to hand that binder to

[1:23:49] Robert Urick, which was not, you're not one of our people, you know?

Alex Smith

[1:23:52] Yes.

[1:23:53] Yes.

[1:23:53] Okay.

[1:23:54] So the, so he looks down and he sees like some kind of, uh, portal or porthole famously

[1:24:00] on, on this show.

[1:24:01] But the, uh.

[1:24:01] That's a deep cut.

Elliott Kalan

[1:24:03] That's a zap on zappa level cut.

Alex Smith

[1:24:06] I did my research for this job guys.

[1:24:08] So he looks down, he sees that he could go, he could go into the neighborhood if he jumps

[1:24:14] down this cliff, but it's very far.

[1:24:16] And Susan Lucci tells him he's going to die if he tries to do it.

[1:24:18] He doesn't believe her.

[1:24:20] Uh, he starts at this point, it's a bunch of people.

[1:24:22] And again, I am the high ground.

[1:24:23] I get it.

[1:24:24] Mm.

[1:24:24] He, he realizes everything she says is a lie.

[1:24:28] So he jumps, there's a great.

[1:24:30] But everything the other Susan Lucci says is true, but he doesn't know which is which.

[1:24:34] Right.

[1:24:34] Uh, so there's a great, this is obviously just for a commercial break because he jumps

[1:24:39] and he goes, ah, and then it fades to black.

Elliott Kalan

[1:24:41] You're saying in a regular movie, they wouldn't really fade out of a climactic scene.

Alex Smith

[1:24:46] They would pace that differently in a regular movie, but it's very clearly like.

[1:24:50] It's fade out three years later.

[1:24:52] Yeah.

[1:24:53] So then he, he comes to at the bottom of the cliff in a negative, like the negative, uh,

[1:25:00] you know, every, the film is negative.

[1:25:02] Okay.

[1:25:03] Photo negative version of his neighborhood.

[1:25:05] He runs into his house.

[1:25:06] He has a, a bunch of exchanges with Susan Lucci where she sort of talks to him about how he,

[1:25:12] he decides to take his helmet off.

[1:25:13] She tells him not to.

[1:25:14] He does it anyway.

[1:25:15] He takes his gloves off.

[1:25:16] He takes the suit off so that he can embrace his, his wife who is sitting at the piano and

[1:25:20] she's unable to get outside of this like blue haze or whatever.

[1:25:23] He runs over to her.

[1:25:24] He gives her a hug.

[1:25:26] Uh, he takes the, he takes all these leaps of faith.

[1:25:28] And then eventually the whole family is brought together.

[1:25:30] Susan Lucci freaks out when they all figure out that she has no power over them.

[1:25:34] Kind of an elaborate sense.

[1:25:35] And she gets sucked back through this like big black hole thing.

[1:25:39] And then they wake up all of a sudden.

[1:25:42] Now they're in their regular house.

[1:25:44] It's been redecorated back to the way it was before.

[1:25:47] Uh, so he's like, this is my beautiful house.

Elliott Kalan

[1:25:51] This is my beautiful wife.

[1:25:52] I know how I got here.

Alex Smith

[1:25:54] Yeah.

[1:25:55] Precisely.

[1:25:55] And then he steps outside and there's a pretty obviously, uh, juxtaposed, like, uh, special

[1:26:01] effect of smoke rising from the country club over the hill from their front yard.

[1:26:06] And that's the end of the movie.

[1:26:07] Isn't that awesome?

Elliott Kalan

[1:26:09] Country club burns down.

[1:26:10] Wow.

[1:26:10] He really scoured the Shire on this one.

[1:26:12] Okay.

[1:26:12] Sure.

Alex Smith

[1:26:13] Where's Sharky and Worm?

[1:26:15] And I don't know.

[1:26:16] They don't, they, the thing that they don't tell you that bothers me later, finding this

[1:26:20] out later is so many things are back to normal at the end, but you don't find out is, is

[1:26:24] Tom still in hell?

[1:26:27] Is he on the floor dead at micro digitech?

[1:26:30] Uh, what, what happened?

[1:26:31] To the other consequences of this is grace.

[1:26:34] The secretary.

[1:26:35] Is she back to life?

[1:26:36] Yeah.

[1:26:37] Uh, there's all kinds of good question.

[1:26:39] There's a limo driver.

[1:26:40] Did he ever get his teaching degree?

[1:26:44] I mean, all they had to do was wish to be back together as a family and they're back to

[1:26:48] normal.

[1:26:48] Yeah.

[1:26:49] So I would hope that everybody else is back to normal as well, but everybody doesn't

[1:26:53] seem to want to tell you that.

[1:26:55] So that is the movie.

[1:26:56] What, what do you guys think?

[1:26:58] Are you sad you missed it?

[1:26:59] Are you glad you missed it?

Stuart Wellington

[1:27:01] Or had to not miss it.

[1:27:03] Now, if we, if we, if we have to not miss it and we want to watch it, how does one watch

[1:27:08] this movie, Alex?

[1:27:10] It's on YouTube.

[1:27:11] It's on YouTube.

[1:27:12] Whole thing.

[1:27:13] Okay.

Dan McCoy

[1:27:14] Uh, Dan, you go first.

[1:27:15] I will, I will say that I literally, uh, sort of two thirds of the way through this, uh,

[1:27:20] went onto my letterbox and added invitation to help to my watch list.

[1:27:25] Cool.

[1:27:26] So that's a had to not miss it.

[1:27:27] I, it both sounds really funny and it sounds like it might have that quality that like a

[1:27:35] dumb horror thing sometimes has where the ineptness of the plotting kind of makes it creepier.

[1:27:42] Like it, it, it, it evokes like a dream you might have where, you know, it doesn't necessarily

[1:27:50] make a whole lot of sense, but it's all the more disquieting because of kind of the, uh,

[1:27:58] the nonsense of it all.

[1:28:00] Sure.

[1:28:00] So I'm sort of curious to see it.

Alex Smith

[1:28:02] I think, I think that's true.

[1:28:04] I think it's very much a product of its time and it's satisfying to me in that way that it

[1:28:08] feels like, it feels like all the conventions of the day is what they're trying to hit those

[1:28:12] boxes they're trying to check.

[1:28:14] And I like all of those boxes mostly.

Stuart Wellington

[1:28:16] So, yeah, I feel like this is definitely, uh, either it's, it's either a sad we miss it

[1:28:22] or a had to not miss it.

[1:28:23] So, uh, maybe I'm going to head over to YouTube and look up Bruce Springsteen.

[1:28:31] What's the name of the name?

[1:28:31] Bruce Springsteen.

[1:28:33] Uh huh.

Elliott Kalan

[1:28:34] Yeah.

[1:28:34] I think I will, I'm sad I missed it.

[1:28:37] I don't know if I'm going to had to not miss it necessarily.

[1:28:41] If only because I have limited time in my, in my day.

Stuart Wellington

[1:28:46] But if the, and you don't want to mess up the YouTube algorithm in your home.

Elliott Kalan

[1:28:50] Yeah, I have a YouTube algorithm.

[1:28:52] I don't want the YouTube.

[1:28:53] I want the YouTube algorithm to continue to just, just feed me unboxing videos and, uh,

[1:28:58] QAnon anti-vaccination videos.

[1:28:59] That's really what I'm on right now.

[1:29:01] Yeah.

[1:29:02] Uh, but, uh, but it sounds, but it sounds like a blast.

[1:29:05] Thank you, Alex, so much for telling us about it.

[1:29:06] I feel like I lived it through you.

[1:29:08] Uh, and someday maybe I'll, I'll, I'll, maybe someday I'll accept that invitation to hell.

Alex Smith

[1:29:13] I did end up telling you guys literally everything.

[1:29:16] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:29:17] I mean, you left very little to the, to, uh, to the imagination.

Stuart Wellington

[1:29:21] So, so in addition to

[1:29:22] Uh, being a producer for our show.

[1:29:25] Yeah.

[1:29:26] Is there anything you would like to plug, Alex?

Alex Smith

[1:29:28] Oh, of course.

[1:29:29] I have a radio, a weekly radio show that you can check out called Big Howl and Possum.

[1:29:35] Uh, again, as my other moniker, Big Howl or Howl Dottie.

[1:29:38] I do a lot of music and comedy under the name of Howl Dottie.

[1:29:43] You can follow my Twitter account, which is at Howl Dottie.

[1:29:46] H-O-W-E-L-L-D-A-W-D-Y.

[1:29:49] I'm realizing right now that I forgot to say when my radio show is.

[1:29:52] Uh, it's 10 p.m.

[1:29:54] Eastern time on, uh, 91.9 WFPK, Louisville, Kentucky, which you can listen to anywhere in the world at WFPK.org.

[1:30:03] There's back issues, back episodes of it on Mixcloud.com as well.

[1:30:08] Big Howl and Possum radio hour.

[1:30:10] I have a Twitch stream called Big Howl and Possum.

[1:30:12] Uh, and then I have a, uh, I have a weekly podcast with a, with Patreon bonus episodes that is called Howl Dottie's Fast Track,

[1:30:22] where me and a guest write a brand new song in one half of one hour.

[1:30:27] Wow.

[1:30:27] Uh, it's a lot of fun.

[1:30:28] It's, uh, and it's, um, it's been going for a little while.

Stuart Wellington

[1:30:33] We did a, uh, we did a sad country song about going to the movies, right?

Alex Smith

[1:30:37] Stuart was on it, uh, quite a few weeks ago.

[1:30:40] And then, uh, and then I just recorded an episode with Charlene, uh, Stuart's lovely wife, uh, that will be out next week.

[1:30:48] This week's show is with, uh, um, is with, uh, Brian Quinby of, uh, Street Fight Radio.

[1:30:54] And, uh, let's see the, um, uh, there's, uh, anyway, there's a, just basically, uh, I have, I have guests on mostly comedians and podcasters,

[1:31:05] sometimes musicians, and we talk through writing a song and then the song is at the end of the episode.

[1:31:11] Um, so that's called Howl Dottie's Fast Track.

[1:31:13] Look for that anywhere you get your podcasts.

[1:31:15] I'm on Instagram as Howl Dottie.

[1:31:17] Uh, Facebook as Howl Dottie.

[1:31:20] So, uh, just look for, uh, in my, uh, comedy as an entertainer, I am known as Howl Dottie.

[1:31:27] As a podcast producer, I am known as Alex Smith, my real name.

[1:31:31] Uh, the fact that there's no difference between those two personalities is, uh, I'll just, I'll just say is not my problem.

[1:31:37] And, uh, I also produce, uh, Charlene's podcast.

[1:31:42] I know The Owner, which you should check out.

[1:31:43] It also has a theme, uh, song written by me.

[1:31:46] Um, and then, uh, uh, oh, I think, I think that's it.

[1:31:50] I think that's, that's, I guess, plenty, but yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:31:53] Uh, we're, uh, we're on the Maximum Fun Podcast Network.

[1:31:57] There's plenty of other great shows on there.

[1:31:59] Please check it out.

[1:31:59] If you'd like, if you like this show and you want to listen to more of it for some reason,

[1:32:03] uh, you can always support us over at MaximumFun.org slash join.

[1:32:08] Uh, am I leaving anything out, boys?

Dan McCoy

[1:32:10] Uh, we want to thank our editor, Alex, who's here in front of us.

[1:32:14] That's him.

[1:32:15] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:32:15] Uh, and we want to thank you, the listeners.

[1:32:17] You're very, you're very welcome.

Alex Smith

[1:32:18] I'll say you're welcome instead of yeah.

[1:32:20] Yeah.

[1:32:21] Thank you.

Stuart Wellington

[1:32:22] Uh, and thank you listeners for putting up with our nonsense.

[1:32:25] Uh, I've been Stuart Wellington.

[1:32:27] I've been Dan McCoy.

Elliott Kalan

[1:32:28] I've been Elliot Impeccable Bruce Springsteen Impression Kalen.

[1:32:33] And I am Alex Howaldotty Smith.

Stuart Wellington

[1:32:36] Bye.

[1:32:37] Bye.

[1:32:38] Bye.

FH Mini 34 - Missed That Movie: Invitation to Hell

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